The Platonic Ideal of Surprise[Private][Dated]

Xarith lazily twirled his pencil around in his hoof as he leaned over his counter and stared out to his shop. Not many had passed by today, and it was almost to the point where one could call the place abandoned save the lone zebra manning the counter.

The Alchemist set his forelegs onto the table and shoved his head into it, sighing loudly. Staying like that for a while, he only moved to re-position the pencil that he still played with in his hooves.

Tayari wandered down Main Street, a lot more comfortably and less nervously than the last time, though funnily enough heading to the same store as he had last time, to the best of his memory. I just hope he's got some food besides coconuts. I didn't think I'd dislike them so much, or that I'd have to choke them down before I could find anything else. Come to think of it, a little less violence than last time would be good too, I suppose.
Walking into the store, he smiled and said, "Good afternoon, Xarith. Enjoying your day?" A proper look showed, Nope, he's bored out of his mind.

"Just a slow day today, Tay," Xarith mumbled, head still in his forelegs. "Not much going around at the shop since the two are out on a run for me today. And in all honesty, I just think people are avoiding the coconuts." Pulling his head up and straightening himself out, he looked to his zebra friend.

"But I have rum too, so that at least counts for something, right?"

Tayari briefly remembered the last time he'd had any alcohol, becoming tipsy from a single mug of cider. "I... suppose that's something, though not exactly my cup of tea. And on that note... you wouldn't happen to have any food besides coconuts for sale, would you?"

Xarith rolled of his counter and disappeared behind it before reappearing, seemingly taking the short amount of time out-of-sight to properly straighten himself out. He walked around the counter, next to Tayari, and pointed over to a small isle of shelves towards the middle of the shop.

"Well, there is where we keep most of the food stuff, if that is what you are looking for," Xarith said lightly. "Just take a look around. I can ring you up when you are ready."

A massive thud rang from outside, rattling the structures windows and shelves. A gangly pegasus with too much hair over his eyes walked into the door, scouting out the interior and trying to adjust his sight to the relative darkness. "Does anyone know a Zebra by the name of Tayari?"

"I got a, uh, thing here, for a misses... Tayari... is that a pronounced right?" The pegasus began waving the note around.

Tayari took a step towards the food items, before the pegasus made its entrance.
"Well, I don't know any zebra mares by that name, but I also happened to be named Tayari. Are you sure it's for a mare?"

Xarith was already behind his counter, already having a hoof on his dirtboard and extendable spear. Just peaking lightly over his counter before stepping out again with his weapon well concealed in his sleeve and board on his back, he put on a friendly smile.

"Yeah..." Xarith said just as lightly. "Just to make sure there isn't a mixup of any kind here." Then looking to the crate, he sized it up before taking a stop back. He idly wondered to himself how the thing got to the shop in the first place.

"Don't want a shipment like this to be delivered to the wrong place. Looks important."

The Pegasus slapped Tayari with the note. "That there is a traffic citation. The nice Griffon outside saw you cut off our landing and we had to make another approach. He told me to give this to you."

He turned back to Xarith. He had delivered to this store before, so he didn't take any time before explaining. "Yeah, you got a shipment here. Says something about Scotland, but I've never heard about no Scotland... Anywho, just sign here, and we'll bring them. Poor bastards been rattling around in there all week."

Xarith facehoof'd.

"Just give me the clipboard," he said as he looked over to the box. "I don't know what'd be jumping around in a place like that, nor do I want to know if it came from some random place I've never heard of, but hey. Might as well find out."

The zebra just took the quill in his hoof and hastily scribbled his signature into the paper, mostly missing the lines to do so, and more or less in a hurry to open up the crate.

"Anything else?" Xarith said politely.

Tayari concentrated of all on the note. What's a traffic citation anyway? And who blames ponies for walking on a street, rather than trying to land on it? And most of all...
"How did the griffon get my name?" he mumbled.

The pegasus ignored him and went about his job. "Yeah, the person sending them said something about a long lost distant relative who had been breeding them until the care did her in. Apparantly-" he stopped speaking to heave a crowbar at the crate. "- You are the last living direct relation to this mystery mare- or is it zebra? Do you zebras have words for the, eh, ladyfolk?"

"Gah, now I sound rascist." He heaved at the box once more, before giving up. "Here, eh, move some of those shelves aside, we'll get better leverage without being in your doorway."

Xarith nodded as he began to push the closest shelve back to make room for the pegasus, silently thankful that this was one of the less populated shelves in the store. While it was a bit much to push around, it wasn't heavy enough to cause any discomfort for Xarith. He easily pushed it out of the way before turning back to the pegasus.

"Distant relative, huh?" The Demolitionist Alchemist said as he tapped a hoof on his chin. "I'll have to look into that later..."

The pegasus and his mates heaved the crate in slowly, scuffing up the floors as they went. It took sweat tears, and one avowed death threat to the doorframe, but eventually the crate made itself inside. When the pegasus was done, he was so tired from the heaving he forgot to actually open it. He walked through the door, took a deep breath, and flew off.

The crate sat in the center of the floor, the crowbar cast to the side in the room.

Xarith had already sprung on the opportunity.

"Sweet," he said smiling to himself. "Free crowbar. Can't go wrong there." Taking it in his hooves, he stood on his hindlegs and comically bashed at the crate with reckless abandon until it (for what ever inane reason.) exploded into thousands of tiny wood fragments that flew away and seemingly disappeared in the air.

Putting up his foreleg to shield his eyes and face from the murderous woodchips, he waited for them to subside before lowering his protection.

Tayari stood, thinking on the confusing matter of the ticket as the events unfolded. Only on hearing the sound of a crate being crudely smashed did he return to an awareness of the outside world. "...Must've missed something."
From there, he waited patiently as well, until the surprisingly obscurative crate pieces settled down.

Straw billowed forth from the crate at a rate not quite unlike a torrent. As if released from hammer space, the endless contents of straw and feed and what appeared to be consistently well placed water dishes.

Finally, the torrent settled on the floor, only about knee height at all points in the store, flowing upwards a bit at the walls due to the forceful nature of its expulsion.

Up from the straw began popping up little furry black heads, with beady black eyes. Their gazes wandered about the room, confused.

Xarith just stuffed the crowbar into his cloak as he moved over to the nearest dog and stared at it with as much confusion as it had. He leaned down and tried to get a better look of it.

"Huh, you little guys are pretty resilient, now are you?" the zebra said jokingly, a light smile on his features.

Tayari looked at the resulting scene blankly for a full minute, as if processing the sight and wondering if it was real. Finally, he reacted with a simple, "What...?"

This particular canine that Xarith picked up had a deathly fear of stripes, and as such evacuated itself near instantaneously. The mess was far from large, bearing that the dog itself was only about a few pounds, but it was impressive enough to note that its impact with the straw made a pattering sound on the floor. The dog tilted his head away, as if to signify "No, that wasn't me, I couldn't possibly have done that, why, I'm not even going to acknowledge you."

More and more heads popped up from the straw, adorable little fuzzy doggy heads, all uniformly a gleaming black with luscious curls and dainty eyes. As if unaccustomed to the very concept of freedom, their only actions were to stare around stupidly at the two zebras. They watched the two with an intense attraction.

Now, scottie dogs are smart- too smart almost, and once they noticed that one of their own had oh so impolitely relieved himself on the Zebra, they took it upon themselves to form a fire brigade of sorts, grabbing broom, rag, cleaner, and all manner of fine implement from the depths of the straw. The formed a ragtag line of wagging tails and tools in tooth, and began cleaning away at the mess.

Just carefully laying the dog back down into the straw, Xarith looked around to try and make sense of what events were unfolding in front of him. He tapped a forehoof on his chin for a moment before placing it back down to the ground and gesturing a light shrug as he turned to Tayari.

"Well, the wood is still back there if you need it. And if it's all got straw in it, I think I may have some extras in the back," the Alchemist said as he simply moved behind his counter and resumed his regular loafing position.

"Just mind the dogs. Don't want to step on the poor things."

Tayari barely registered Xarith's words, instead looking with great confusion at the dogs. "...This can't... this can't possibly be real, can it? I've got to be dreaming. Or hallucinating, in which case... Where's the nearest medical facility from here?"

Xarith just shrugged lightly as he cleaned some stray debris from his counter, and getting back into his bored position.

"Well, if you want immediate help, I guess my shop would be the closest place," the zebra said waving a hoof around, "But I don't know many places where you can get some medical help around here."

One of the Scottie dogs pawed at Tayari's leg, a map held in it's mouth. On the map was a scribbled crayon illustration of where to go if one wanted to find a hospital.

Meanwhile, the remaining Scottie dogs began filing out of the straw, numbering about forty-seven in total. One of the dogs, who had a little grenadiers cap on his fuzzy little head, stamped a littlest paw on the floor, and the Scotties all rowed up in two neat columns of eleven-by-two, with two scottie dogs in parade attire forming up at the front of the columns.

When they were all formed up, the few that lingered outside the formation were sharply scolded by the one up front- including the one who had just been offering Tayari a map. It whimpered as it rushed into formation. With the formation complete, they began a comprehensive effort to recover their logistical supplies from the straw, and to place the remaining straw into neat bales for use in fortifications.

Tayari examined the paper briefly, before putting it aside, thinking, This is either a dream where I don't need to go to the hospital, a hallucination where I'd probably hurt my real self in my attempts to go, or reality. I still haven't the faintest idea which, but until I found out, I may as well go with it.
With that internal declaration made, he simply began to watch the dogs as they did... whatever they were doing, at least until something happened that demanded action on his part.

Xarith just watched the dogs go about their work as he just went about his. Laying out his hooves and sticking his head back into them, he called out to Tayari.

"Just tell me when you are don't, Tay. Don't want to get in the way of the dogs or anything. I was kinda thinking in closing down early for today."

No sooner had the bales of hay been tucked into a corner and assembled into a fortification (complete with Scottie Dog necessities like a Scotch cellar and kibble), then a the most adorable coup ever transpired. It was only a split second, but before you could blink- the illegitimate martial captaincy that the leader had was stolen in a flash by the most rambunctious Scottie Dog of all, a young upstart who refused to fit into the status quo.

The coup was bloodless but hairy, and a small blaze erupted in the governer's straw palace. The Scottie dog streets were stained with the tears of crying Scottie dog orphans. The Scottie Dog barracks exploded in a orange ball as the powder stores were detonated by the rebellion.

All this happened in minutes, and when the coup was done, a parliamentary democracy of Scottie Dog representatives stood proud, erecting a straw monument to their struggles in the corner of the shop. The scottie dog people began exploring the shop, finally free from the callous disregard of their prior ruler. They began seeking means of exploiting the alchemical treasures their god-given homeland oh-so-bountifully provided in abundance.

Tayari watched the dogs as they reorganized themselves and began investigating the shop. "Okay, on the... very unlikely chance that all this is really happening, is there anything in the shop we should probably make sure they don't mess around with? Because however supernaturally organised they may be, I don't trust them to know how to use everything responsibly. Especially since they might have developed explosives."

Xarith had already pushed a large amount of miscellaneous things in front of the door to the back alchemy room along with himself sitting on top lazily as per the day required. He just glanced over to the dogs and flopped over his surprisingly comfortable pile of things.

"Don't worry about it too much, Tay. It's probably not too health for you if you do think that you may be hallucinating at this point in time." With that, the zebra went back to his lethargic state and continued to pseudo-nap.

Tayari nods. "You make a good point." With that, he proceeds to walk to the corner of the room, watching the dogs while hopefully out of their way for a while.

A lone economist among the Scottie Dogs devised a scheme to exploit the system by selling money that didn't exist and guising it as a bank. Soon he was giving out loans on credit with intent that the interest on those loans would eventually be sufficient to fulfill his own claims as to his wealth. Gradually inflation was engineered to engender debt more and to force the Scottie dogs to rely on his debt more and more.

Three minutes later, in a frenzy of speculation the market crashed and their was a rush on the bank to discover that the money was nonexistent. Hundreds of the dogs lost their homes.

The scottie dog government, so perilously in debt to foreign financiers (like the sewer rat mafia, and the Communist Collective of Cockatoos), exploded overnight into a brilliant anarchy. Scottie dogs, seeking asylum abroad fled from Xarith's store in troves, taking their things with them. Soon the shop was empty save for two scottie dogs who had been unable to migrate due to their youth, brothers.

They found a nice niche in the shelving and curled up for warmth.