Silver frowned at Mystic's outburst, but kept quiet about it. She did seem rather touchy today... When they arrived at the wagon, Silver looked from Mystic to Grey, and then walked up to the door and rapped his hoof against it. "Excuse me, Mr. Virulento? It's Silver Shield again, with Mystic Heart and Grey Mane. We were wondering if you could talk to us for a minute?"
A masculine voice can be heard behind the wooden door. "Hopefully you have my book...I would like to be rid of this place sooner rather than later." The sound of latches can be heard clicking before the door opens, revealing the zebra known as Virulento. Virulento glances at all of you, and lingers for a bit when he spies Mystic Heart. "Ah," he says. "Come in. Don't mind the mess. I had...an incident this morning." As he allows you all to pass and closes the door behind you, he adds, "It's all been taken care of." At those words, a slight [size=-2]*tink tink*[/size] is heard from one of his display cases. The case, you would notice, is covered by a blue sheet.
Grey Mane looks around the wagon, then at the cabinet, then at Virulento. "Mind telling me what the incident itself is? Also, could I take a look at the thing you have under that sheet? Like I believe I said before, I am a collector of sorts."
As she enters gracefully, her eyebrow twitches at Grey Mane. She should really let me handle this... Chuckling nervously, she nods gently. "I do have it. However, before I return it and you're on your way, we really need some assistance... and I really think you're the one who could help us. Now, I know you're not fond of Ms. Sparkle..." she says, as she levitates the doll he had leant to her, a strand of Twilight's hair tied around its neck. "However, she's missing... and we really do need her back. A few other things have gone wrong that I think only she can help us fix." She gives him a pouty look, and opens her eyes wide for him. "Please, Virulento. You know that the book drives ponies to madness. I'm sure you can understand that she was just over-taken by the madness. We really want our friend back, just as much as you want the book. Do you think you know a way that this doll can help us find her, perhaps?"
Virulento glares at Grey Mane. "Trust me, you don't want to 'collect' what I have under that sheet. She has a way of nicking things that aren't hers." He directed that last comment toward the case. To Mystic Heart, he sighs and replies, "Place the book on the table, Ms. Heart. The doll won't be necessary. I'll retrieve Ms. Sparkle." He walks over to the display case and removes the sheet, revealing a very small Twilight Sparkle. Upon seeing your respective faces, she appears visibly relieved. After lifting the glass door of the display case, he says to Twilight, "You will still have to make reparations for the case that held the book, and the Poison Joke I used on you. It's not so easy to find, yes?" He gently latches on to her with his mouth and brings her over to the table, placing her upon it. Up close, you notices that Twilight is roughly about half the size of the doll. She turns to Virulento and bows, saying something in a high-pitched, squeaky voice. Spoiler: Roll Perception Silver Shield: 8 + 8 = 16 Mystic Heart: 45 + 6 = 51 Grey Mane: 6 + 8 = 14 Mystic Heart can't quite make out what she's saying, but she gets the gist. Twilight is apologizing profusely for stealing the book.
She smiles sweetly, closing her eyes most of the way as she does. "Of course... and thank you ever so much." She turns her head and her horn glows gently while she levitates the book from her bag. Her eyes focusing more on the table as she floats the book over to it. "Now, that reminds me..." she says as she looks at Tiny Sparkle. "Will you be able to return the rest of your friends without this?"
Twilight nods in response, then hangs her head sheepishly. [size=-3]"Polymorphing was something I learned to do fairly early..."[/size] Even before the book can be set on the table, Virulento snatches it from the air and tosses it in its old display case. Then he turns to you all. "Let this be a lesson! Don't dabble in things you know nothing about." He walks back to the table and sighs. "Now, is there anything else you'll be needing? If not, I have places to be. I've considered visiting Hoofington. I hear there's a mage there of no small ability." Twilight rolls her eyes at the comment.
Mystic Heart gives Virulento a look and smiles. "Well, if you're ever in the area of Canterlot, or if we ever should meet again, I would love to have a better look at some of the items you've collected. I think I could spend days looking these over." She takes a few moments to take the book footnotes out of her pack as well, and to un-string Twilight's hair from around the doll using her levetation. Leaning forward for Twilight to get on her she simply says; "Come on. We'll fix up an antidote to your poison joke, and get everything taken care of."
Spoiler: Roll Perception for Virulento Total 72 Virulento raises an eyebrow. "I find your proposition...most interesting, Ms. Mystic Heart. I'll be sure to visit Canterlot when I get the chance. A certain, Princess of the Night has piqued my interest as well." Twilight leaps upon Mystic Heart's head, taking care to to muss her mane. [size=-4]"Whew! The sooner the better. I just hope they can forgive me..."[/size]
Grey Mane nodded. "Thank you mr.Virulento. May our paths cross under better terms." She made something sort of like a smile before heading to the door and waiting for Mystic.
Her ears turn and she give and interested smile at Virulento. "Excellent! I do look forward to it." She winks at him before turning and walking out of the varda with a sway to her hips. She gave a side-ways stare at Grey Mane once the door was closed and they were out of range. "How could you think to be so forward with a man of his caliber? Of course it was Twilight he had hidden there, who else would it have been? Requesting his help was the proper means to get her back. Besides, I'm sure with the quick manner in which he gave her up to me it was just some sort of misunderstanding. Of course, out of respect for Twilight, I won't bother to ask what it was about because it's over." Well, now that THAT was out of her system... "Alright Twilight, please point me the way to where we can get the cure for poison joke. We can have everything handled without an issue." She smiled again, swiftly going back to a proper social demeanor.
She nodded gently. "You should work on that after we get back. For now, just leave the talking to me."
Grey Mane shrugged. "Couldn't hurt to try." She then looked back. Then thought. "How do you think the professer uh.... Toxic is doing?"
Follia had contorted himself into the shape of a captial 'B'. As part of a list of things he tries to do to keep his body fit, yoga was something he always saved for travelling abroad. At home, he had machines and things but here there was only him, Mitzy and the ferret. And Spike but the dragon wasn't likely to be all that useful. The professor made a series of horrible, and judging by his face contortions, painful transitions back to standing on all four hooves before wondering out the door to eat breakfast. He was unsure whether to ask for pancakes or pink frosting covered in maple syrup. Clearly, the health plan was working if his cravings were getting this bad. Lucky he had meditation and a bag of seeds to keep him from temptation. So, as he added another drop of maple syrup to the sticky, pink fluff, he looked around the room. As another spoon of the icing and syrup makes it halfway to his mouth, he notices that no-pony he knew was around at the moment. Did they go home already? Avoiding the waitress' dirty looks, he gobbles the contents of the spoon, wondering if he should have added some chocolate to this.
Silver kept glancing at Mystic's head. It didn't make him feel very secure to know that she'd been nabbed from out of her bed in the night, shrunk, and kept in a glass case. If it could happen to her, it could happen to anypony, right? She wasn't exactly lacking the means to defend herself, as she'd proven during the battle with that...thing. At least they knew the antidote for Poison Joke. But something still felt off. After all this, could it really be that easy to fix everything? Just...have Twilight put her friends back to normal? Before this whole incident, he would have trusted the purple unicorn almost unconditionally, but he didn't know how long the effects of the book might last, or if they were permanent, even. What if she was just playing them until she was back in a secure position? He was suspicious of how quickly she had given up on something she'd been willing to turn her best friends into dolls for. In response to Grey, he said, "Uh, fine, I guess......why wouldn't she be fine?" He looked at her questioningly.
Grey looked to Silver and sighed. "If she got any sleep at all last night it was minimal. She appears to be going through stress or something. Have you not see- Never mind."
"So basically what you're saying is that she didn't sleep well last night." All right. Information simplified, filed, and stored away. "Okay everypony, let's get to it. Grey, you should go back to the Hay and Stay to make sure the Professors know where we are. Also, help Spike if he wants to go back to the Library, and make SURE that nothing happens to the dolls. And Mystic, you should probably take Twilight to get the antidote for Poison Joke." He looked around. Three ponies, two jobs. Was there anything else they should do? Two ponies doing either of those chores would not be efficient... The book was returned to Virulento. Check. Spike had all the dolls (as far as he knew). Check. Everypony was accounted for, nopony was missing. Check. Hmmmmmm... "Perhaps should go and check out the Library, and make sure it's all in order. The townsponies are all afraid to enter, so somepony needs to go explore it and give the all clear. Any objections to the plan?" He looked around at the group.
Silver tapped his chin. "Probably the Library. First of all, that's probably where Twilight would prefer to change her friends back; second of all, that's where Spike will probably want to go; and third of all, there's always a slim chance something actually WILL be wrong at the Library, and in that case it would be nice if I knew somepony else was coming." He nodded. "And Grey, if the Professors are ready to leave, you should probably bring them, too. Might as well have all of us in the same place." He thought of breakfast (and how he wouldn't be having any) and sighed.
