Finally.
We're landed, Celestia's making weird noises for the sake of not being bored, Delmar's still sleeping, and there's no internet... or at least, there isn't any wifi that I can find that I can connect to.
Why?
Well, we're kinda in a town that's just... out there.
Like as in, the private jet had to land on a strip of highway because there wasn't an airport kind of out there.
Not that it seems to bother the locals though. Seems like the diplomat guys must've called in advance or something, 'cause there's bales of freakin' hay with "Celestia" written on it. Literally. I'm pretty sure that the call probably consisted of something along the lines of "Oh hey yeah we've got a horse queen named Celestia visiting soon. Get ready!" or something like that.
As for me...
"Why isn't the girl in school, mommy?" I heard a toddler ask somewhere to my right as we filed along.
"She's probably much older than she looks." the mother in question answered dismissively, "You can probably ask her if you want."
The little boy ran up to me from between the crowds, as per his mother's suggestion, and proceeded to ask just that.
"Around eleven or twelve." I replied, "I'm honestly not really sure anymore..."
"Then why aren't you in school?" the toddler continued.
I smirked. "I guess you could say that I never really needed to go to school to begin with." I paused for a moment, realizing that I practically just suggested to him that skipping school entirely is an option. "--Though, it's because I already learned everything that I needed to know. If you study hard, then maybe you can finish early too!"
The kid grinned, and fled back into the crowd to his mom.
As for me, I continued walking, somewhat listening to the "tour guide" that we were now led by.
"...And that there's our water tower. Old thing's got quite a few leaks, but it does the job."
Celestia silently nodded as a young girl tried to shove hay into her mouth.
Celestia wrinkled her muzzle. "Ew." she spat, dropping the hay from her mouth, "That tastes like cardboard."
Yup. I definitely know what that crap tastes like.
"...Established in the mid twentieth-century as a potential industrial city by a wealthy entrepreneur, but soon afterwards, he fell out of favor with the various factories that wanted to build due to the rough terrain of the region."
Delmar raised a hoof, at first to swat away another hay offering, and next to ask a question.
"So, you're basically saying that this town was abandoned by its founders?" Delmar asked, eyeing what appeared to be relics of some sort of abandoned factory.
"Yup." the guide answered as we turned a corner, "After the only factory that was built here closed down, many of us resorted to self-sufficiency simply due to how remote our location is."
Delmar curiously scanned the streets around him, taking in the time period that the place seemed to be frozen in.
"I take that you've been self-sufficient for the past half a century or so because of the factory's closure?"
"Yup."
"And many of you are descendants of factory workers?"
"Yup."
"Have any of you even been outside of the town borders?" I groaned, cutting Delmar off before his next question.
"Well no duh. What did you think?" the guide answered instead of his usual yup, "We're not that isolated."
Celestia chuckled behind me from hearing my short exchange with the tour guide.
An awkward silence blanketed over the entire group, tour guides and all. Except it wasn't particularly that awkward, given how an event is only considered awkward according to the observer, but... eh. Yeah, awkward moment of silence.
"Puuuud-diiiiing!" a voice in the distance suddenly shouted.
What.
So, the sheer randomness of hearing "pudding" being shouted down the road earlier aside, I'll just assume that the aforementioned mention of pudding was probably just a parent calling their kids in for some or something like that.
As for Celestia, aside from her and Delmar repeatedly running from hordes of children trying to feed them hay, they seem to be pretty charmed by the tiny town.