February 20
I woke up at the first light of dawn, even though it had been kind of a late night last night. I guess I'm still on a more Equestrian schedule. I can't decide if I like that, or if it would be better if my internal clock shifted a bit later.
Aric was pressed up against my back, curling against me for my body heat and maybe something else, since he was hard against my rump. I hoped he wouldn't try anything from this position; my tail would get in the way and could get sprained if we got too enthusiastic.
But then I realized he was still asleep, and I rolled onto my belly, carefully so not to disturb him too much. He grumbled a bit in his sleep but adapted to our new arrangement.
I stretched my wing out over his side, because he'd pushed the covers back some and I thought he might be cold, and I put my forehead against his to let our breaths intermingle. Then I dozed back off again.
When I woke for the second time, he was running his hand through my mane. It felt really nice, and I didn't open my eyes right away because I thought he might stop if he saw I was awake. But my tail probably gave me away: I couldn't help it. My body knows what it wants even if my mind tries to slow it down.
I tucked my head up under his chin and contented myself with letting him run his hand over me. He knew that I was awake, though, and pretty soon he stopped and said that we ought to get up before too long. I told him that I didn't think that there was any real hurry, especially since we weren't being interrupted by telephone calls.
He chuckled and said that I had a good point.
We snuggled for a little bit like that, then he said that his other arm was asleep and rolled onto his back and I put my head down on his chest and reached a hoof just a little bit under the covers and lifted up the blanket.
Aric pushed it back down and asked me what I was doing, and I told him that I wanted to see and I wouldn't touch unless he wanted me to. He said that I was being silly but after a little bit he finally took his hand off the blanket and told me that I could.
I flicked my tail eagerly, but I'd made a promise and I meant to keep it, so I just lifted the covers up high enough to get a good look. It wasn't quite the same as a stallion's, but it was pretty close. Certainly close enough to work.
When I was finally satisfied with my inspection, I let the covers drop back down and nestled up against his chest and let him run his hands over me for a while. He really liked playing with my wings and I let him, even though he was messing up my feathers a little bit.
Eventually we got up. I sat on the bed and preened my feathers while he took a shower and got dressed, and then we drove to a wooden restaurant called Cracker Barrel.
It was a bit crowded and confined, and I probably would have been uncomfortable if I wasn't with him. But the food was good, and we had a good breakfast talk. He was a little more relaxed than he'd been in the morning.
We had to kind of rush on the way back because there was a matinee performance of the play on Saturday before the night showing, and he said that he was running a bit later than he wanted to, especially since he had to fix one light that had stopped working during yesterday’s performance. So he drove to the theatre parking lot and we kissed and he went off to work in the theatre while I went back to my dorm room to get my vest so that I could fly around a bit and work off some of the tension in me.
I didn't land until it was nearly dinnertime. Peggy was in our room doing homework when I got back and she said that she'd missed me. Then she asked if I'd had a good night with Aric, and I said that it could have been better, but we'd had breakfast at Cracker Barrel and gotten a lot of stuff worked out and hopefully next time would be my night. I told her I was a bit frustrated by the slow progress, but she said that maybe that was for the best. It wasn't what I wanted to hear, but she was probably right.
Ugh, I hate it when things get complicated. I just want to have some fun with someone I like.
Peggy and I went to dinner together. It was Italian again, and this time I avoided the noodles and just stuck with salad.
After dinner, since I didn't have any other plans, I went back to Christine's dorm room with Sean, and watched some more Star Trek. There was one episode I thought was particularly cute that had little furry things called Tribbles, which reminded me a lot of parasprites. There had been an infestation of them in Fillydelphia when I was a foal, and there was a little while where we really had to stretch our food because of everything they'd eaten. So I saw right away that they were bad, but the crew of the Enterprise didn't realize it as quickly as they ought to have.
Then we started hearing sirens outside, more than was normal. I picked up on it first, and then Christine said something about it too, and checked her telephone to see if it knew what was going on.
While she was looking, Sean said that the police department also fights fires in Kalamazoo, and there was probably a big fire somewhere in town, and that's where they were all going. He said that if he wanted to rob a bank, he'd start a fire on the other side of town first.
Then Christine said that it wasn't a fire, that there had been someone who was driving around town shooting people and nobody knew who he was or where he was or why he was doing it but he’d just shot two people at a car dealership on Stadium Road, which ran right by campus.
That made me really nervous, but Christine said that it was probably safe here. It really put a damper on the mood, though, and none of us felt like watching any more Star Trek. I said that I ought to go back to my dorm room to make sure Peggy was okay and they thought that was a good idea and offered to walk with me.
I thought that might make it more dangerous for them, and said that I'd be fine because I could fly and they couldn't. So they walked down with me to the front door and we looked through the windows to make sure that there weren't any strange cars waiting nearby, and then they opened the door and I took off almost straight up to get some altitude.
I relaxed a little bit when I got back to Trowbridge. I could see Peggy through our window, so I dropped down and went through the front door and then galloped up to our dorm room.
She didn't have any idea what was going on, so I told her and she got really pale. She checked to make sure that our door was locked while I was sending a telephone telegram to Christine to tell her that I was alright, and I sent one to Aric too, even though I knew he probably wouldn't see it until after he was done with the play.
Peggy found a news video on her computer and we both sat together on her bed watching it and trying to get a sense of what was going on. It kept getting worse, and unlike a rampaging monster that's pretty easy to find and avoid, nobody knew who was doing it or why or where he might strike next.
Then we just huddled together in her bed, because there was nothing else we could do.
Oh....
That's certainly a dark turn. Not too uncommon, unfortunately. Just a touch of realism.
Ugh, I remember seeing this on the news. 6 people were lost on that day.
Some big mood whiplash, eh?
We passed from Silver and Aric having a goo time, to a litle cultural misunderstanding to that very downer moment.
Things are getting a little heavy here.
This is always a horrible situations to be in. The sense of not knowing. It's funny how despite all our communications technology we can still be so unaware when things go wrong. It makes that sense of helplessness even more profound.
On a more comedic note.
Good enough for who it's for! (I'm not sorry)
To change the tone from the other comments, is this in the same universe as your other story about a pony exchange student's reactions to, ahem, human male anatomy? If so, I'm afraid Silver Glow is going to be very disappointed if her relationship with Aric gets much hotter...
Very much a chapter of highs and lows. Cute bit with Aric, followed by reality cutting in.
I had to look the shootings up. I figured that part had to be real, since this story does have a lot of basis in fact.
Edit: Oh man, the references to Uber... the Cracker Barrel they went to... and then thinking about that crazy dude at the Walgreens...
Poor Silver isn't going to be sleeping soundly for a while, is she?
Let's just be happy Silver Glow didn't go for dessert instead of breakfast, considering 4 people ended up getting shot to death there that night.
"Wooden restaurant" is probabaly about the best explanation I've ever heard. A pony might appreciate the salty food.
A sad touch of reality, but one that must be addressed.
Well.
That sure as fuck was whiplash.
So, I've been thinking this for a while now, but this story should really have the sex tag at this point.
And honestly "looking at my boyfriend's dick" is starting to toe the line of mature.
Oddly enough, my Mom and I tried to go to a Cracker Barrel that day, but it was full and had over a half-hour wait. So we went to a place called Red Wing instead.
I was working just about a mile down the road from MIT on the night the marathon bombers had their chase through Cambridge (MA) a few years back. One of my coworkers walked by the spot where the security guard was shot probably five minutes before on his way to a rehearsal. I stayed in the store late because I didn't want to send people home and wasn't sure I should go home myself, we just hung out with the doors locked and the lights off listening to the police blotter. It's really a surreal experience and I'd certainly have been as terse as Silver is talking about it in a journal. Even now one of the strongest memories I have of it is that kind of floating feeling of surrealness that would have made it hard to write about. A very well written chapter IMO, well done. (Not that I don't like them all, but you know.)
Sad commentary on American society.
I love this story so much.
And I thought it was gonna suck so hard when I first saw it and read it when it was in the new column.
Then I came back to it.
It's right in so many ways.
Keep on.
Interesting developments.
I had forgotten those shootings were in Kalamazoo.
Feb 20
Welcome to America! Here in Arizona, you can escape from a prison or lunatic asylum, run down the street to a gun show & buy enough guns to equip a small army or a large street gang. But, you will have to pay cash because you can't get a credit card or a checking account without a background check.
I personally think it should be harder to get a lethal weapon than it is to get a library card. In Arizona, this makes me a Liberal Loon
7132313
I think teens can handle more than you give them credit for.
Wow quite a shift in the spectrum of mood settings in this chapter. First the cutsey stuff with Silver Glow and Aric and then over to the shooting. It hits close to home for some of us readers. One thing I find interesting though is how sexually forward Silver is. I'm used to hearing how the guy usually makes the moves. I like how Aric is considering Silver over what he would want, even though Silver has now made it clear she wants more.
7132148
Moreso than you might think . . . this isn't something I made up, sadly.
7132151
I was on my way to work in Lansing when I heard about it.
7132166
It does, unfortunately. There's nothing you can do but wait and hope.
7132168
No. That one took one extreme; this one's more towards the other end of the scale.
7132195
Unfortunately, it is.
She's not the only one who's going to have trouble sleeping.
7132201
My red deck's a pure burn deck, too. There aren't any creatures in it, so I can mulligan until I get a good hand.
7132231
That's one of their most distinctive features, really. It's funny, too, because they're playing towards a sense of nostalgia a lot of people don't really have, but the Ben Franklin in my old hometown had hardwood floors and sold those candy sticks. . . .
7132249
Unfortunately.
Well, that was a downer. It will be interesting to see how Silver processes this though.
I keep forgetting what day of the week they're in. It would be helpful knowing the day of the week for each chapter to keep track of her schedule. I suppose I could just check a calendar, but have you thought about adding that to the chapter titles?
Probably one of the most glaring differences between Earth and Equestria. Ponies have to deal with attacks from otherworldly monsters we don't see the likes of here, sure- but they're easily-recognizable as threats, to flee or contain. In nearly any civilized Western country, the biggest threat to humans is other humans- and figuring out who the "bad guy" is can be all but impossible until it's too late.
(A couple of years ago, I came home from work to find part of my street closed off by police. Turns out there'd been a shooting four doors down from my apartment. And I don't even live in a bad part of town!)
7132513 Not even close. Try again. Without a NICS check, no business will sell you a pop gun, even with cash. Little colorful ponies who can fly are fantasy, just like buying a gun without a background check from a real business.
7132313
Yeah, it probably should. I'll sleep on it.
7132383
I've been there a couple of times, once after a police chase ended in a shooting just off campus--right in front of the cemetery, in fact, which just made it odder, and another time watching firefighters pull a guy out of a Blazer that had rolled over into a pond.
7132370
The one in Kalamazoo?
7132388
Sad but true.
7132168
What was the name of that story?
7132426
7132449
Yup.
7132513
Unfortunately, that's true in certain cases in Michigan. It's something I think about occasionally, since I work with developmentally disabled adults, and some of them could legally purchase certain firearms.
Different states have different rules, of course.
7132530
Given that you're picking up downvotes, maybe they can't.
7132611 No link because it's M-rated, but our good Admiral's "The Breakup."
7132533
In the equine world, mares make the moves.
7132588
It's actually easy to keep track right now: I'm posting on the same day of the week that the journal entry is. So in storytime, it's Saturday.
Admittedly, if you live in some part of the world other than the US, you might have to apply a correction factor, but it will remain the same.
7132593
Yeah, and that's a major difference between the societies. From what we've seen in the show, Equestria has more horrible monsters than Earth . . . but they're instantly recognizable.
Unless they're changelings, I guess.
7132604 Also amusing you're talking about your burn deck in the same thread; my job is running Magic tournaments so that's the group I was in the store with during the shoot and chase and so forth.
7132602
Actually as I understand it that isn't always true: there are loopholes, like private sales, for example, that don't require NCIS checks. And in Michigan, you can legally buy a long gun without a permit or a background check; you don't even have to register it after you've bought it. Handguns, you need a purchase permit to legally buy from anybody (except a FFL dealer, but I assume that they do background checks on the spot).
7132530 I certainly could. But then, one thing I could have handled as a teen is turning on the "Mature" filter, so this might be a "better safe than sorry" situation.
Of course, there's the unfortunate fact that Mature + Sex is the de-facto stand in for "erotica" on the site, so that can send a mistaken impression in a case like this too. I sort of feel like they should just add a "clop" tag and disambiguate a bit. Or put in an R/XXX rating distinction equivalent.
7132669
I don't aim to cross the line into mature territory, but I can see how the sex tag might be required going forward.
I felt like that was an issue in Social Bathing. Mods required it to be tagged Mature + Sex, even though it isn't in any way a clopfic.
First, I'd like to thank you, Admiral, for this story. I enjoy it a great deal.
Second, if I may be so bold, I'd like to see more of Meghan's interaction with Silver: I find her deliciously awkward and cute. I'll hope.
7132635 I somehow completely missed that. Thanks! If you ever missed a day though, would you try to post twice in a day to get back on schedule? Now that I know how it works though (and I really don't know why I didn't notice myself ) I could probably make the adjustment if you got off track. Just curious what the plan would be.
Closest I've ever been to something like this was during Toronto G20. One of the torched police cars was on the corner in front of the building I was guarding. Windows all around were smashed too... I think we were the only building close by to not have cracked or broken windows.
I've been threatened with knives, I've had someone threaten to shoot me that I actually believed was armed and willing.
But you know what?
That doesn't compare to the fear you can get from the uncertainty of it all. Sitting with 5 other people out of sight, knowing that your safety is purely based on luck or just not being noticed. In our case we had a fairly big surrounding plaza that I think kept most people back. Most violent protesters won't get too far away from the crowd. Mob mentality is a fascinating and I get to observe it a lot.
Silver being so forward is kind of how I always saw ponies in a realistic setting when it comes to sexual terms. I imagined them as being very free with it, since they probably have heats like a horse there are no 'whoopsie' pregnancies so sex is for fun as much as anything else.
7132726 7132700 Frankly, I always saw them the opposite way. The show obviously has clear real-world reasons for not breathing a single word about sex, but from an in-universe perspective, that great silence seems to tell me that Equestrian culture similarly hardly talks about it at all. We see that the ponies highly value both friendship and romance, and that they're very open about those (well, except for Lyra and Bon-Bon, if you assume they really are in love with each other), but sex? We don't see or hear anything about that at all.
Of course, there're other possible interpretations; the camera could've just missed all the T- or M-rated talk... but to me, the simplest explanation is that ponies just don't talk about that.
GEORG
I have never bought or sold a gun so I could be mistaken. It is my understanding that in Arizona businesses have to do a background check. However, a private individual selling to another individual does NOT & this is the loophole gun shows exploit
I wonder what Silver's views on weaponry will be? She's already shown she's happy to carry around a polearm (once it's got a ribbon to make it a proper weapon), and ponies in general are armed with their magic at all times.
Maybe she'll be more inclined towards the idea that mentally stressed folks should have some kind of support network provided by the community? I mean, you don't want to have unicorns going crazy all the time and trying to rewrite history or conquer a town with magical artefacts or cast mind control spells on an entire town or whatever else it is crazy unicorns do...
I'm kind of expecting to see some of her tribalism thing on display when they're talking about this now...
7132604 Well at least Michigan isn't a euphemism for bat shit insane like Texas is in Norway.
7132388 Stuff like that happens in every country. It's usually localized to an area and doesn't get too much attention, unless the Media get a hold of it to drag up advertising clicks from sympathy/fear and/or have a political agenda to push.
7132513 Ugh. Stupid Leftist propaganda like this keeps getting pushed through social media too much. There is no loophole with open air gun shows here in the States. This is stupid media and political fear mongering at its best. It's easy to purchase a gun when you have no prior criminal record (and the vast majority of people don't). You would have a better time going to private owners than going to gun shows.
Hell, Europe has huge gun shows as well like the IWA at Nuremberg, Germany. They are still ongoing in their 2017 exhibition.
Also, you don't even NEED to purchase a gun to have one. Plans and blueprints are available online for all kinds of weapons. (I have a downloaded archive I scanned through just for the fun of it.) You only need the metal manipulating\fabricating equipment and time to make a gun or any kind of weapon. It's not hard. Modern guns have a lot of intricate and precise parts that have to be expertly manufactured, especially with something like rifling a barrel needs precise metal working and equipment that most people can't afford.
Though gun enthusiasts actually have AK Build Parties where a group come together to build AK-47's out of their garage. You can also easily purchase parts to build with in many countries and it's not illegal to do so.
And automatic weapons aren't too hard to get on your own since it's usually done with home modifying certain parts of the receiver to have that feature. It would require a good bit of knowledge about guns (it depends on the design), some dedication, and if you do have someone that is willing to go through that, is already willing to do anything to murder people. Automatic weapons as you think of them are highly regulated and the gun owners\sellers would be severely punished with jail time and a massive fine. Getting a license for automatic weapons is a big hassle and requires yearly fees.
5 months ago, there was this Muslim couple, a man and woman who were ISIS supporters, who used single shot rifles with 10 round magazines to murder a dozen people. You don't need automatic weapons to murder people and all those weapons were legal to purchase.
People, stop trying to blame guns, gun enthusiast culture, and American culture for the wrong doings of a very tiny minority of crazy people. Even if you banned guns, they would still have knives to stab dozens of people with instead.
If the Aric-problem and it's different incarnations that are on the horizon go on for the rest of the year, Silver's going to go on a binge when she comes home...
As for the rest: good on you to not skirt any aspect of what she'll experience. Once more it holds true that you shouldn't have a Biscuit if you don't want to be forced to think.
The most suspense now arises from how the comment section will look in a few hours.
7132604 Nope. One in eastern Massachusetts (I live a town over from where the Patriots play)
7132697 7132635
It is also conceivable that Silver Glow could miss a day. I would be disappointed if she did but it would make sense to happen occasionally. And I wouldn't blame you, Admiral. What you're doing can't be easy and I think I speak for all Silver's readers when I say how grateful I am that you have kept this up. If you and Silver ever need to take a day off, because life gets in the way or just to recharge, I'm sure we'll all understand. Just don't make a habit of it or it could undermine your momentum. Keep up the good work.
7133059
Except that there is in some states, because the state sets the laws about who can buy and who can sell, and in some states a licensed gun dealer at a gun show (or wherever, really) can't sell you a gun, but a private individual sitting at the next table over can. Heck, in some states you can even buy guns by mail.
And I should point out that one of the things that often gets blurred in these debates is lumping all guns together when in reality different guns have different classifications. In Michigan, you need a purchase permit to buy a handgun from anybody except a FFL shop (who I presume does a background check), but as long as you're over 18, you can buy long guns to your heart's content without a permit or a background check.
Both true.
Although I think it would be fair to say that most people wouldn't have the skills to build one, even if they had the blueprints. Yes, you can 3-D print one, but from what I know of 3-D printing and handguns, you'd wind up making something that would explode in your hand when you tried to use it.
I personally don't know what the answer is. I think it's fair to say that we'd all like to keep guns out of the hands of crazy people who are going to go on shooting rampages or murder their families or whatever, and we're all okay with sportsmen and the vague category of 'good guys' having guns. How we as a society ensure that happens, I have no idea whatsoever.
I believe you meant "I took off"?