The days zoomed by as the six stallions returned to Buckgrove. Soundwave, Duskfall and Dawn taking some time to recover their minds after their unfortunate, but unsurprising confrontation with their parents. Sour, Sweet and Acidic meanwhile, stayed with Cluttered. It wasn’t ideal for them, but surprisingly, Sweet was the most empathetic and sympathetic to the recent events. Although, some logic could’ve been drawn from the fact that Duskfall was a Unicorn; so he could’ve easily have been ignoring Soundwave and Dawn’s feelings altogether. This however, was even more surprising, as the other two had noticed that there was a greater sympathy placed toward the two Pegasi. Not that either of them had any issues with it. It was moreso the shock that had yet to fully sink in.
The trio had also been helping Cluttered at Canvas Corner. Specifically, tending to the cleaning around the shop. Not that there was much of that. Given the fact there were no customers, Canvas Corner remained relatively silent. The location didn’t help at all either, with the shop being located in a relatively hard to reach alley through one of the less busy parts of the city. Still, Cluttered insisted that the location was nice. Despite the shadows cast from the bigger buildings around the alley. “It does the body good to get away from the light every now and again!” Cluttered would insist occasionally when the trio went to ask him about the possibility of relocation. It always made Sour, Sweet and Acidic so confused when they heard the same answer over and over again.
It was during the sunset of the last workday that kicked off things once again. At this point, the four of them were just leaving from the shop after another dull and boring day of nopony coming in and checking the shop out. The trio yawned as Cluttered closed and locked the front door of the shop. “I’m beat” Cluttered exclaimed as he caught up to the drowsy three. “But we didn’t do anything… Nor did we get any customers” Sour responded. “Ah, but dear Sour, that’s the joy of being able to just show up!” Cluttered then retorted with a smile. Sour rolled his eyes as he responded with “Whatever floats your boat I guess” before the four of them left the alley. Sunset was just ending as they trotted out of the alley; seeing the last remnants of lavender hitting the sky and the seas at the beach near their exit point. “Would be nice to get off of the shop before sunset happens. The colours are wild!” Cluttered chirped out. It was true. Sunset was a sight to behold even back in Manestralia for the trio. “Yeah and tomorrow we have the weekend off. So, if you want to, we can spend the evening down here! Could bring Duskfall, Soundwave and Dawnri- I mean Dawn” Acidic responded. The whole event that had happened had definitely given the three something new to get used to. This being Dawnrise, or rather, just Dawn’s identity. A few days prior, Dawn explained everything that revolved around their inner self and had decided to just stick with the name Dawn until they could find something else to add onto the end of the name. Something perfect for them.
“Yes, well, I’d still like if we could spend the day cleaning your house. It’s a mess and we’re lacking in space!” Sweet then interjected. Cluttered looked at him as they passed by the beach to get to Cluttered’s house with some worry. “Yeah… Well… I think that’s more of a thing for me to-“ but before Cluttered could finish, Acidic interrupted. “Oh please, it’s the least we can do! After all you and the other three have been so generous in letting us couch surf, the least we can do is help keep the areas we stay in clean and tidy!” he replied as he, instinctively, used his wings to lightly hover in the air for a little moment. Then touching back down onto the ground and trotting ahead. Sour and Sweet gave one glance at each other before the four of them crossed the beach and back up the familiar hill that they all knew well at this point. To the house that they all shared for the time being. The condition of the house looking worse every-time they looked at it.
It wasn’t long before the four of them got inside and quickly ate the last things within the fridge. The kitchen had been adequately kept up, but it still lacked a gigantic and proper cleaning. Still, it was usable. The things they ate being the last of the hay bacon which had been made into hay bacon sandwiches. The butter that had been spread on the bread melting slightly as the hay bacon was put together in the sandwich. It didn’t take long for the four of them to absolutely devour their meals too. They were small, yet fulfilling in the best way possible. It wasn’t until Cluttered finished his however that they all began heading to bed. As Cluttered made his way up the stairs, he shouted down “I’ll bring you three down some blankets!” before shutting his door for a moment. A few moments passed by as the three downstairs heard rummaging and banging before Cluttered came back downstairs. As Sweet turned around to look at the staircase, he was bombarded with the three blankets. He swam out of the little pool of blankets as he grabbed the green one. Acidic grabbed the orange one and Sour grabbed the last one; the yellow one. “Good eye for colour coordination, Cluttered” Sweet spouted off as he got himself wrapped up. Sour and Acidic looked surprised as he said this, looking at Cluttered who was smiling instead. “Glad to see you’re not as… Unwelcoming… As before Sweet” he responded as he then added a “Well, see you all in the morning” before he trotted back up the stairs to his room. His door slamming shut as the three stallions heard him falling out of his bed presumably when he got himself into it.
“You know, I do wonder why he’s always so insistent on keeping this place as the mess it is” Sour muttered to the others. His voice was low, but audible. Low to make sure they didn’t disturb Cluttered, but loud enough to still be heard clearly. “Maybe something’s happened that we don’t know about…” Acidic responded as he shrugged. “Maybe he’s got a dead body in here! You never know!” Sweet then interjected. The other two looked at him; himself being in the middle of the three on the couch they were sleeping on. Sour and Acidic snickered a little bit as Sour then added on. “Yeah, maybe we’ll find our Alicorn body under all that mess!” he laughed out. The other two chuckled along with him as Sweet used his magic to close the curtains. Levitating the top of the curtains to be able to move them easily. “You know Sweet, you should really take a trip to the library tomorrow. Borrow some magic books and maybe, when we’re back as one, we’ll know more than just levitation” Sour then suggested.
Sweet looked at Sour as his eyes gazed at him with some hesitation. “Oh please… Levitation is… Is good enough for me. For us, I mean” Sweet began to protest. “Look, why don’t you sleep on it? Duskfall’s a Unicorn too, y’know. Maybe he could teach you once he’s had his time to himself?” Sour then asked. Sweet looked away. Acidic looked at Sweet, then deciding to interject. “Is it because of those magic classes back in Manestralia? The ones we flopped on when we were expected to do wonderfully in our tests?” he asked with some curiosity in his voice. Sweet sighed as he simply nodded vertically and just asked “Can we save this conversation for… For later?”. Before he could even get an answer however, he closed his eyes and sunk into the couch. The other two, understanding what was going on, simply said in unison “Sure” before they went to sleep as well. The moon faintly being able to glow against the curtains as the three of them slept through the night.
When morning came, the three awoke with some grumble and stretching. In their minds, they’d never get used to sleeping on a couch or on the floor. Although, it was definitely better than being out in the cold and without any warmth. Sweet was the first to get off the couch, trotting to the kitchen as he went to look in the fridge. Unfortunately, what Sweet found was the butter and nothing else. It was a depressive sight. Still, he knew there was enough bread at least for toast. So, he got to work. He used his magic and brought the butter out of the fridge; then getting the bread out of a cupboard nearby. It was brownish bread with some visible seeds woven within it. “This should do” Sweet said to himself as he popped the toast in the toaster and stood in the kitchen. About halfway through the toast process and with two plates of toast already done, Sour came in. His muzzle risen in the air smelling the toast and his stomach rumbling. “Here’s yours” Sweet told him as Sour looked at the pair of plates. “Take that one in to Acidic” Sweet then said to Sour. Sour rolled his eyes as he grabbed one of the plates and left the kitchen, returning not even a moment later to get his own plate. As Sour left the kitchen again, he saw that Cluttered had made his way down the stairs as well.
“I see the pair of you already got breakfast. I guess Sweet is in the kitchen making it right?” Cluttered asked the pair. As if on cue, the question answered itself, with Sweet trotting in with two plates being levitated in the air. “Don’t think I forgot about you!” Sweet chirped out as he sat back on the couch. Himself digging into his plate as he placed Cluttered’s on the table infront of them. Cluttered sat on the floor as he looked at the plate. His stomach rumbling, but his mind seeming almost repulsed by the toast. “I think I’ll pass” Cluttered then said as he turned it away. “Did I do a bad job?” Sweet asked with some offense in his voice. The other two looked at both Sweet and Cluttered whilst Cluttered insistently responded with “No! It looks good, I’m just not hungry”. Sweet eyed him with a great amount of suspicion as he continued eating his own toast. It was almost comical how offended Sweet felt about the rejection. It took about five minutes for the three to stop eating before Sour turned to Cluttered. “So, what do you plan on doing today? Planning on visiting the beach this evening I assume” Sour then asked, adding his presumption at the end. Cluttered nodded, but then responded. “I don’t know what to do today though… I’ll probably get some more sleep I don’t know” he said as he looked out toward the closed curtains.
“You can’t go to sleep! There’s so much we could do! Like clean this place!” Acidic protested. “Yeah, well whatever you plan on doing, I’m not joining” Sweet then interjected. The other three looked at him as he said this. “Are you taking our advice then?” Sour asked him. “Well, I figured I might as well give it a try. There’s no exams… No tests… Just me and a book” Sweet responded. There was something about tests that got him in all the wrong places. Something so anxiety inducing to him that he just couldn’t get over. It wasn’t like the stage; where he knew he could perform, and ponies would love him regardless. Where he could ignore any negative press. It was something he couldn’t ignore. The bad scores. The requirement of looking at paper for hours in the faint hope that something slipped and stayed in his mind. If he failed the tests, which he did back in Manestralia, he’d be belittled and shamed for his slow adaptation to magic. “Well, you head off to the library then and we’ll stay here with Cluttered” Sour replied. Without a word, Sweet quietly left as he felt odd. Something about the process of learning magic was off to him. Maybe that was just because he grew a distaste for it during his school days, but it didn’t feel familiar to him; and unfamiliarity meant unknown. Unknown meant inexperienced and inexperience meant embarrassment. Shutting the front door behind him, he began trotting off to the library, leaving the three inside the house.
Back inside the house, Sour and Acidic started cleaning up the plates. “You gonna eat that? Or should I chuck it?” Sour asked. Cluttered nodded horizontally as Sour trotted into the kitchen. Four plates precariously balancing on his hoof as he wobbled into the kitchen. Cluttered went to leave the room, but Acidic stopped him. “Come on Cluttered, it’ll be good to clean up and repair things!” he said to Cluttered whilst slightly airborne. Cluttered wanted to protest, but found he lacked the energy to do so. He simply sat on the couch and sighed. “You two really don’t know what’s in that mess…” he then said out loud. The other two looked at eachother, confusion in their eyes. “What is in that mess?” Acidic asked, eagerly awaiting an answer. “I’d prefer not to elaborate on it” Cluttered responded. Sour put his hoof up before Acidic could say anything else. Acidic then looked at Sour, his expression full of bewilderment at the sudden lack of wanting answers. He huffed as he simply said “If we find anything suspicious we’ll let you know” before flying to the kitchen and starting the process of cleaning. “Figured I’d stop him before he got too personal. Strange considering I’m the one who usually gets too interrogative” Sour then said to Cluttered, his self-reflection not really affecting him considering he didn’t seem to have a problem with what he knew about himself. Which made Cluttered slightly envious. “You know, you’re always so calm about your flaws” he commented. Sour looked at him as he responded. “Well, it’s just what I know about myself. It’s not like I’m the only one with flaws. So, why would I judge anyone on their flaws? Unless it’s Acidic or Sweet that is” Sour chuckled out as he said the last part. “Sweet and Acidic? But why them?” Cluttered asked. “They’re me. We’re all eachother. I can make fun of them because it’s me. Same with Acidic and Sweet doing the same to me” Sour responded. Cluttered seemed like the concept didn’t make sense. So much so that, by the time he did get around to processing it, Sour has already moved to a room down the hallway.
“Hey, wait! Don’t go in there!” Cluttered shouted as Sour trotted into the room. Sour turned around as he saw Cluttered right behind him. “But we have to start somewhere!” Sour protested. “Then why don’t we start with the front room first…?” Cluttered then slowly suggested. Sour took a moment to think about it as he came up with a compromise. “If this room can’t be cleaned by me…” he began. “Then you can do it!” he then added as he pushed Cluttered into the room. “What-!” but before Cluttered could say anymore, Sour trotted back to the living room. Cluttered looked around as he got flashed of his memories. Specifically, of him slashing canvases with a red hue. The mess being created from the last time he looked at a photo he saw at the other end of the room. One he didn’t want the others seeing. The photo, at first glance, looked to be of a building. However, as one got closer, they would find that around twenty colts and fillies were sat outside of the building. Almost like a yearbook photo. The sign on the building reading ‘BUCKGROVE ORPHANAGE’ and right there, three spaces from the center on the right, was Cluttered. A small, almost unhappy looking colt. The memories fully flooding back of the times he had at the orphanage as he remembered the physical pain, the psychological pain and the general unhappiness he felt in the orphanage. The times he was blamed for other pony’s actions, and subsequently locked in his room without dinner. The shaming of his writing, his music and even at points his art. Although it wasn’t nearly as bad as the oppressive shaming he experienced for his musical talent or writing talent. Mainly due to him keeping it hidden. Something he’d end up leaving the orphanage to pursue. His artistic career.
By the time he had processed about a tenth of the memories, he was already dissociated. His mind not connecting with the reality around him as he got stuck within his own thoughts. The few happy memories he had were with Duskfall and Soundwave. Even then however, they weren’t even in the orphanage. Not Duskfall anyway. He saw the orange Pegasus next to him in the photo as tears began forming. The happiness creating an emotional response as opposed to the negative. By the time Sour came in to check on the progress of the room being cleaned up, he saw Cluttered curled on the floor; holding the photograph. “Cluttered?” he asked. However Cluttered didn’t respond. He simply sniffled. Looking concerned, Sour tried to tap Cluttered. However it didn’t work. No response was given. “Acidic, might need your help here!” he shouted out. Acidic, a few moments later, flew in. He saw the state Cluttered was in as he now understood why Cluttered didn’t want to tackle any of what the other two wanted to help with. It wasn’t just the photograph. He saw a few canvases in the corner that had been stained in red, in a very violent fashion. On top of that, he saw a note and a knife. He’d wondered why he couldn’t find any knives whilst he was cleaning, and now he knew. He didn’t even have to read what was on the note to know exactly what Cluttered attempted. He quickly grabbed both the note and knife as he rushed out of the room. He scrunched up the note and threw it in the kitchen bin and put the knife away after giving it a thorough clean. The red, dried-up substance on the knife cleaning off after some heavy scrubbing.
When he came back into the room, the next thing he did was say to Sour “Leave him there for a minute. Let’s get those out” before he grabbed three of the seven canvases that had been struck. The mess sort of clearing up as he went around the room and uncovered a bed of sorts. Clearly a guest bed. The sheets were crinkled and dusty, so he stripped them off and immediately told Sour “Get me a laundry basket” before putting the sheets and any other clothes he found in one big pile. When Sour left the room, Cluttered seemed to snap back to reality, it having been quite a bit since he first entered the room. He looked around as he saw that the things he had in the room had vanished. “Where’d-“ but before he could speak, Acidic interjected. “Hand me that photograph” he said as he put his hoof out. Cluttered looked at him, and then to the bed as he pieced together what he’d missed. “But this… It’s special to me” Cluttered weakly protested. “I’m not getting rid of it if it’s special to you. But if that’s the source of what me and Sour saw in here, it needs to go” Acidic firmly responded. Cluttered didn’t relent as he held the photograph tightly. “Please… You don’t understand… That orphanage was where I grew up” Cluttered began to respond. But before he could, Acidic asked a very vital question.
“And did you enjoy growing up there?” he asked, with a stern look to him. Cluttered took a moment to answer, himself clearly struggling internally. That was, until, he finally responded with a simple “No… No I… I didn’t” before looking down at the photograph. “But… That orphanage… It was where I met… Where I met Soundwave. We both grew up there…” Cluttered added on as he remembered the friendship they had in the orphanage. Quite vividly, he recalled the time after the photograph was taken. His new friend. His only friend. The one who ever cared for him in the orphanage. The one who stood up for him and got in trouble with him. “Okay… So where is Soundwave on this photo then?” Acidic asked as he was looking at the picture. Cluttered looked up at Acidic as he responded “Well… Here...” Cluttered then responded, pointing to Soundwave on the picture. “Alright... But if you have bad memories with the place, then you don’t need this picture. Especially if it’s triggering those intense negative emotions and experiences… Even if it’s a part of your past, sometimes you have to let go of it" Acidic then explained. He opened the wing nearest to Cluttered as an attempt to comfort him. Cluttered leaned on Acidic whilst staring at the picture. “I… I suppose that’s… That’s true. I just wish that it hadn’t been like it was” he then mumbled out, Sour entering the room whilst the other two were talking. He put the laundry basket down and put the clothes and sheets inside of it before carrying it back out; somewhat concerned. “Is he alright?” he asked Acidic. “I’ll… I’ll be fine” Cluttered instead responded. He held out the picture to Acidic, saying “It’s best to get it out now before I change my mind” as he waited. Acidic happily took the picture, quickly flying to the bin and chucking the picture in. Then wrapping the trash bag up and putting it in the big bin outside that Cluttered had on the side of his house. When he came back in, he saw Cluttered beginning to also help out with the cleaning. “Definitely need to replace the flooring…” he said to himself as he noticed the slight ripping in the carpet flooring. “Well, let’s focus on just cleaning it first. Renovation can come after. Once the space you have is at least… Better” Acidic replied. Sour in the meanwhile, had come back after the pair heard the washing machine start up. Coming back with a “What’s next then?” before Cluttered and Acidic looked at eachother. “Well, this room still needs some… Maintenance. Can you focus on this room whilst me and Cluttered head upstairs? Maybe clean the room next to this one too” Acidic asked and simultaneously suggested. Sour nodded, and with that, Cluttered and Acidic headed upstairs.
It took them a few minutes to get up the stairs, with Cluttered being somewhat slower than Acidic. He was still slightly in a distant state, although he was still tethered to reality. When they got upstairs, Acidic waited for Cluttered to open his bedroom door before they both entered. It was a mess in here too. Very befitting Cluttered’s name as canvases laid strewn around. These ones however, were blank. With a mountain of them piled up in the corner. “Let’s deal with these first, eh?” Acidic asked as Cluttered nodded. Together, they ordered each canvas from largest to smallest; stacking the larger ones together and stacking the smaller ones together in a separate small tower. “I’ll carry these down, you focus on those clothes over there and strip the bedsheets” Acidic instructed as he carefully flew with the smaller canvas tower first. Cluttered got to work, grabbing the huge pile of clothes he on the floor and tossing it on the little chair he had next to his wardrobe. Then, he got to work stripping the bed. “When Sour’s finished washing and drying the downstairs bedsheets I’ll take them for the night” he said to himself whilst he piled the bedsheets on the chair. When Acidic came back up to get the second tower of canvases, he looked in slight surprise at the amount of clothes Cluttered had gathered together. “Oh, there you are. When you get back up, bring the laundry basket up too” Cluttered instructed as Acidic nodded.
When Acidic came back up the stairs, he looked impressed when he saw that Cluttered had gotten halfway through reorganizing his chest of drawers next to his bed. One thing however, stood out. A photo album of sorts. Alongside a diary and a few other things. “Oh, feel free to look in that album. It has better moments of my life in there than the one earlier” Cluttered spouted off when Acidic placed the laundry basket down. “Sour should be coming up soon, so I’ll leave him with the other room. You take the laundry down and put it next to the washing machine” Acidic then said whilst he himself headed to the bathroom. A job he was very much not looking forward to. Cluttered looked slightly disappointed that Acidic didn’t look in the album, but didn’t care too much as he put it in the top drawer with the diary before putting the laundry in the laundry basket and carrying it downstairs. Sour being at the bottom and waiting until Cluttered got fully down. When he got to the bottom, Sour passed him and trotted upstairs whilst Cluttered carried the laundry basket into the kitchen. After placing the basket next to the washing machine, Cluttered trotted up the stairs and proceeded to finish off the main cleaning in his bedroom.
Sour, meanwhile, seemed to be in what used to be an art studio room. There was a study downstairs that he had cleaned prior; although it wasn’t really messy. The issue in that room was moreso the lack of organization. So, he decided to just double check every other room on the bottom floor before he reached this particular room. When he looked around, the art supplies looked old and out of date. Specifically, the overused green and blue seemed very much nearly empty and had spilled somewhat onto one of the blank sketchbooks. Sour took the first chance he had to get rid of both the paint container and the sketchbook in unison; bagging it up after getting a trash bag from the kitchen. Then, he went around the rest of the room. What was supposed to take a few minutes to clean up at the beginning ended up taking close to an hour as he meticulously organized the adequate quality materials.
Paints were lined up in colour order, their hue and saturation also being taken into account as he sorted them. The paintbrushes that he found were all sorted into two piles, messy and ruined brushes going into one pile whilst unused ones were placed into another. The ruined brushes ended up being chucked away as Sour put the unused ones in a cup he found conveniently labeled ‘BRUSHES’ and then proceeded to work his way around the rest of the room. His inner perfectionist making its way outward as he spent great deals of time on the simplest of things. By the time he had finished, the sun had already begun to set. “Oh crud! Wasted time” Sour said to himself as he planted his hoof into his face. As he did this, Acidic and Cluttered came in; having been waiting downstairs as the pair of them finally came up to check on him. Acidic was worried he’d fallen asleep, however that worry turned into amazement as the pair of them saw Sour’s hard work. “Oh wow! It’s like the mess was never here!” Acidic exclaimed in shock. Sour rolled his eyes as he simply responded with “Yeah, thanks. Now do me a favor and take this out” as he yawned. The cleaning he had done taking its toll on him. Acidic obliged whilst Cluttered and Sour trotted down into the front room.
“You’d think that cleaning would be simple, but apparently it wasn’t!” Sour told Cluttered as Cluttered looked away slightly. “Did you find it hard too, then? I mean, getting the motivation together to clean your space?” he then asked. Sour looked at Cluttered with some confusion, until he caught onto what Cluttered was implying. That implication being that Sour, or rather Covet, suffered with the same problems as him. Sour shook his head as he immediately responded with “Oh god no, I never tried to take myself from this world! I just… Well, it’s better to not think about it for now. What’s gone by has gone by and the progress we made today was amazing! Tomorrow, you’ll have to take down all those old wooden boards on the windows! Renovation is the key to a happier and more comfortable home after all!”. Cluttered responded with “That’s not what I meant but I’m glad that you didn’t try what I tried when I was that low” before the front door opened. When they turned around to expect Acidic, Sweet galloped in holding a book in his magical grasp.
“Welcome back…? How was the library search?” Sour asked as Acidic trotted in, the front door closing behind him as he made his way to the front room. “It went well! I didn’t see Duskfall like I had hoped, but I found this!” Sweet responded as he passed the book he had around. The title of the book being ‘POTIONS OF THE HIGHEST ORDER’ with Sweet then flipping through to a specific page. The page containing a potion named ‘Aquarespiratius’. “The ingredients seem impossible, but our three helpers left a note. So, they’re still watching I presume” Sweet then added on as he then pulled the note off of the page. The note simply reading:
THIS ONE. THE LILY ONCE HIDDEN YOU NEED TO GET.
H
“So, the lily he’s referring to must be this one” Sour then said as he pointed to one of the ingredients. Something called a Breath-Imbued Lily. An extra scribble written down next to it saying ‘THE OLD GALLOPVANT CASTLE’ as the four stallions looked at eachother. “Looks like we know where we’re going next…” Acidic muttered. Cluttered then speaking up. “That castle… It’s over a thousand years old! And abandoned too. I mean Queen Tidal never said why but… If the Lily is there then I’m happy to go with you” he suggested. “Queen Tidal?” Sweet then asked. “Yeah, Ceyonait has a queen. Queen Tidal Serenity. If you’re an Alicorn then after you get yourself back together, it might be in your best interest to speak to her” Cluttered responded. “Yeah… It might be” Sour responded, with the other two nodding their heads. “Well, the first load of washing should be done by now, I took the liberty of throwing in your three blankets so, they’re all washed. Had to flick the dryer setting on though so they’d dry in time. When we got down here anyway” Cluttered the said, trotting to the kitchen as he called out “Acidic, help me with this!” as Acidic flew in.
When the pair came back out, the three blankets were quickly thrown onto the couch as Cluttered trotted up the stairs; coming back down about twenty minutes later to initially speak with the three about travel plans. However, by the time he came back down, the three had already fallen asleep. Each in their own couch space as Cluttered simply said “Huh” to himself before trotting back up the stairs himself. He then proceeded to trot up the stairs and sunk into his bed. He took one last look around his room as he smiled. For the first time in years he could actually see the floor. It made him happy as he entered his own world of dreams. Once the four were asleep, a flicker of purple fire surrounded an appearing Dallasite; who had been listening and monitoring Sweet since he found the book. He kept an almost permanent frown as he muttered “I’ll make sure that meeting never happens” before disappearing in an equal spiral of purple fire.
He reappeared a few hours later, within the mountain cave Arcane and Harmonous resided in. “You made sure they found the book, yes?” Harmonous asked Dallasite. “Yes, but there’s something far more pressing that we have to stop. If he meets her before we can get him back, the consequences will be disastrous to our lifelong goal” Dallasite responded. Harmonous looked at Dallasite, before then looking at Arcane and then responding to Dallasite. “We can worry about that when he’s back together. Assuming his main goal is to reform and then try to meet her, we can act on it when the time comes. We don’t want her knowing about us too soon after all, my little lavender flame” Harmonous said before then adding on something. “Arcane, keep an eye on him. Just make sure there isn’t any preemptive attempt to reach her before we ensure he completes his journey to reformation” he instructed Arcane. Arcane nodded as Dallasite trotted over to him. Harmonous seeming to disappear in the Mist he created before Dallasite asked “Do you think he’d attempt to go to her soon?” before Arcane answered. “Considering I was also watching the three of them today, no. Their friend specifically stated to do it after they had become an Alicorn. Not whilst doing this” which Dallasite got irritated at. “You don’t trust me to do things by myself?” he asked Arcane with himself looking slightly offended. “Well, I had to make sure you didn’t try and disobey him. He’s not exactly fully confident in you. It was only to ensure your guaranteed success” Arcane responded, one of his wings resting on Dallasite’s back.
“If that’s what you want to run with, then fine. I’m fully capable of doing what he wants. But I suppose the little safety net is appreciated” Dallasite responded, laying down and then adding on “I assume I don’t need to watch you whilst you help him” and seeming to go to sleep. Arcane frowned slightly as he thought for a moment, before creating an arrow made of ice. “This should be helpful for tomorrow” he said to himself before destroying the arrow. “I won’t make it too easy, but if he needs help I suppose I can throw in some” he then added on before seeming to go to sleep himself. The day ending with Arcane, Sour, Sweet, Acidic and Cluttered knowing their next goals. For Sour, Sweet, Acidic and Cluttered they’d find the Breath-Imbued Lily. Whilst for Arcane, he’d observe patiently and ensure success for the three he had been assigned to observe.