//------------------------------// // Surrender // Story: The Power Of Names // by Noclipper //------------------------------// The streets of Istormbul did not contain litter or refuse, but in this city, the streets were always empty air, regardless of the mood of the city. The wide main paths of open air separated carefully balanced city blocks, sculpted by, and imbued with, subtle magic of the winged ponies who inhabited the city. Nearly a thousand long bridges bound the clouds together, letting each block be independent yet united. Along the eastern side of the city the view was of the overcast oceans. The western edge floated above grass plains, separated from the waters by a wide beach. It was one of the lower altitude cities that had been built, a tower of a hundred score ponies would just reach the city's underside. A pony looking up from the ground saw only the pale shadow below each thick city block, with gaps as narrow as cracks in an old coat of paint. In this small city of barely a hundred cloudy blocks, several thousands of pegasi live. The youngest learn about their world, each other, themselves, and their unique loves. The adults spend their days taking that knowledge to improve the city in some small way. Finally, the elders watch the rest, helping teach even those who consider themselves done with learning. Many came to this city to work in the small industries that somepony had seen a need for. Many choose to leave, following dreams of whiter clouds, or loves which were born without wings. One left before she was ready, and never returned. ==~~*~~== In the center of the building, a trio of large hollow pillars of finely sculpted cloud somberly waited their time to sound. As smooth as marble, each was tuned into a wind instrument, each with a single note. When the clockwork surrounding the base ticked over, deep notes hummed through the halls and into each room of Istormbul's Second Eastern District Daycare and Kindergarten. Being the final time those notes would play for three days, it was unsurprising that the third note was accompanied by nearly a hundred cheering voices, each with a pair of wings flapping in unison as pent up excitement was released. Out of the wide classroom doorways pastel blurs raced, and the young flocks flooded the hallway. As tightly packed as they could, each tried to be the fastest, even those who galloped along with their wings not quite lifting them. In one classroom, the teacher pegasus futilely tried to smooth out her mane which had blown about in the brief intense whirlwind. The last student in the room hadn't taken flight, but had merely stood as the air settled. Her smile of calm relief wasn't as eager as her classmates as she walked to the open doorway, small wings tucked up against her rusty coat. "Don't pretend to forget it." The teacher said, not even bothering to look towards the filly who stopped at the doorway mid-step. Guiltily laughing, she turned in place, and walked to her cloak hook, the only one in the room which had a school-time occupant in the spring. The student reluctantly pulled the cloak down to the ground, spread it out on the floor, and glared at it trying to set it alight with her hatred. After a step into each of the short sleeves, she crouched down and pushed the garment over her head, shaking around to spread the cloak down her back. A long strap dangled off one side, and with a struggle, she pulled the strap under her, and fed it through a buckle on the other side. After threaded through, she bit the end of the strap and pulled it taut, without making it too tight like any adult did when putting the cloak on her. After a futile effort to make her unwanted garment actually comfortable, she shook her long purple mane away from her face, and grabbed her empty Wonderbolts lunch box. The small pegasus trotted out with a parting word mumbled out through her occupied mouth. After walking down the short hallway to the foyer open to the sky, she approached the center platform and sat, watching as small groups of the even younger foals departed, chaperoned by their caretakers. When she was sure that she was alone, she took a few moments to look down at the lunch box placed at the base of the machine that hummed the class changes, and spread her wings. Her small wings buzzed, fluttered, flapped, and rumbled erratically as she jumped around in small circles, face grit into a determined scowl directed inwards. But as usual, she failed to find the set of movements that would give her just enough lift to rise to the air, or even lift her off the ground for a moment. When her small endurance wore out, her aching wings slowed to a stop, and she sat down, catching her breath after the pointless exercise. She yelled meaninglessly, and brought her feet down on the lunch box. Emblazoned upon it was the scuffed and scratched picture of a pegasus with a mane like fire in flight. The image stared up at her with a grin that now felt more like the hero was mocking her rather than being encouraging. *** Outside the sky was full of travelling forms, some pulling carts, many wearing a pair of saddlebags as they travelled on hundreds of anonymous errands that help keep the city running smoothly. As she walked her familiar path home, the orange filly watched the loose crowd. Letting her imagination free, she imagined who each was, and when she saw a familiar distant acquaintance, the story of their cutie mark. As she crossed the first bridge, a group of classmates who had not yet drifted far from the building spied her. Like many young ponies who were trying to prove how high they were in the pecking order, they eagerly descended to her to remind her that she was lower in the school hierarchy than they were. Three pegasi landed around her, neatly cutting off each escape route of the cloud bound pony. Less neat were the landings of the two colts who surrounded her; One put forehooves down too early and nearly planted his face in the cloud, while the colt who had cut off the bridge retreat skidded jarringly when he landed. But when the cloaked pegasus tried to flee, she darted down the path blocked by the flier who had landed nearly perfectly, who easily blocked her way. The pale blue face of the leader of the small gang grinned at her prey. "How do you do that I wonder," she asked, stepping forward each time the orange filly tried to get her personal space back. "You really must share your secret. Magic shoes? A potion?" She kept up the taunts as she kept boxing her victim in with the help of her two cronies. Carrying the lunch box in her teeth, it was hard to make a coherent reply, but she tried her best. "I on't knoo what you nean," she mumbled around the container's handle. When one colt jabbed her side, her yelp let the box fall to the cloud they stood on. At the edge of the bridge, the clouds hardened by hours of pegasus sculpting merged with the softer barely tamed cloud, and where the mundane object landed, it started to sink into the surface. "Go fry your wings in the sun, Crystal, I'm not playing your stupid games again." She spat weakly, then looked for her lunch box. The colts had kicked it onto the bridge, apparently one of them thought it was worth taking rather than letting it fall through. "Fine, take the stupid box, just go away." She grumbled, resigned to giving it up, hoping it would avoid the fight. "Why would I want that foalish thing? I want the secret on how an earth pony like you convinced the clouds you belong up here!" She pointed her leg at one of her retinue, and one side of the cloak was pulled upwards. "I don't think that's a wing at all, it barely even has feathers!" Crystal pushed forward, forcing the smaller filly between the two colts. Her back feet slipped on the edge of the cloud, and suddenly all that stopped her from falling to the sea below was forehooves digging desperately at the cloud, managing to find a weak purchase as rear legs frantically spun at the side of the city's foundation. "Woah now, this isn't funny any more! Help her back up," one colt yelled before trying to get a hold of the edge of the scrambling filly's cloak. Reaching down, his first grasp only managed to catch strands of the purple mane in between his teeth, pulling them from her head as he yanked upwards. He looked down, meaning to get another look at where the cloak lay, but his eyes were drawn to hers, and for a moment their gazes met. His look was full of anger, it was not meant for the struggling orange filly, but at the other who had roped him into this. Hers showed pure desperation, pleading for mercy that he was ready and willing to give. Crystal jabbed his side hard, forcing him to away before he could get a good grasp. She stepped to the edge of the cloud, looking down at the desperately pleading filly with contempt. "Oh, it looks absolutely hilarious to me!" She stepped down on one leg, digging her hoof in until the orange filly began to scream, her free leg desperately trying to push the attacker off rather than keep hold. With the small gang's intents divided, both of her subordinates rebelled, physically pulling the blue filly back. With all three trying to yell over the other two, none of them realized that she had slipped off the edge until long afterwards. When a truce was finally reached, the three stood at the edge, staring down at the sea, trying to look for her. "Should we, you know, go down?" The leader walked over to the box, and flipped it over to look at the scratched image pasted on the front. "Don't be stupid, they're already going to pick her up, they always blame the fallen. Let's go get some cloud candy, I'll pay. *** The first time she had fallen, she had screamed in mindless terror, even after she had landed on the ground, only stopping when another pegasus hugged the small foal. The second time, the safety cloak opening jerked her out of her terror, and she almost enjoyed the ride down, until the cold water touched her. The third, she managed to steer the descent enough to land in the surf a stone's kick from the beach rather than the sea. On the fourth and final time, she screamed not in terror, but impotent rage as the wind roared in her ears. Seconds after reaching terminal velocity, the safety cloak billowed out, seemingly disintegrating as puffs of clouds expanded and flew away from the garment one at a time while still connected by fine threads of tightly spun cloud-stuff. Each slowed her fall a bit more, leaving her in a much darker harness with one final use, to become a floatation device when the salty ocean rose up to meet her. Small pegasus wings flapped slowly at first. She briefly forgot about her fight, and focused on putting the small amount of lift her wings generated into a fall that angled towards the shore. When she landed, while the water was just as cold as she feared, the shallow surf only reached partway up her legs, and she struggled to walk to the shore, each step through the water's resistance a little easier, until she finally reached the dry beach. Collapsing onto the warm sand, she curled up her legs under her to warm them up, and shook as emotions tore her to pieces. To her young mind, every imperfection of her life amplified. The bullies never left her alone, while her friends often did. The school treated her like she was stupid, then her classmates saw her as the teacher's pet. She was constantly shuffled from the detached oversight of a group home, to the loneliness, or worse, of a foster home. As her mind flowed through all those pains and more, untapped strength pushed her to a stand, and she fought at the one thing that still tied her to her life. The cloak was quite resistant to her attempts to tear any part of it, so she eventually focused on just getting it off. Once the strap was undone and she could pull the uncomfortable harness off, she took it in her teeth and spun in a tight circle, releasing to throw it as far as she could into the sea. Not very far at all. As it impacted the water, the final spell in the cloak discharged, and the ugly thing puffed up into a small cloud floating on the water. Walking away from the shore, she stopped briefly to look at a small tide pool, full of slimy seaweed. She had been taught that she could eat it if she had to, but like most foals, wasn't eager to put that lesson to the test. The plains that started after the small rise at the edge of the sandy beach spread out as far as the small filly could see until the wind off the sea caught her loose purple mane and obscured her vision. Specks of color hinted at wildflowers as abundant as stars in the night sky. When she reached the first, she neatly bit off the small white flower, chewed curiously, and found the new flavor pleasant. She turned to look back down at the beach, at her abandoned safety cloak, and was unable to see a single pegasus between the ocean and the clouds. "I guess they stop looking after you use three up..." she muttered before eating her second wildflower. "It would be so easy for them to just forget I was ever up there, they never even got my name right, not even the teachers. I don't need them, I have plenty of food down here, all they ever do is tell me to do stupid things. I don't need other ponies anymore," she ranted, taking out her anger of the world on the earth, each statement being delivered to the lonely land with a stomp of emphasis. "I can rely on myself, I don't need anything up there." She coughed at the incompletely chewed flower, and began to wander away from the sea, eagerly sampling the flowers as she went. "None of them even remember my name. It's a stupid one anyway, nopony even pronounces it right. I don't even need one if I do everything by myself." She managed to smile at the idea, freeing herself from a life that while not perfect, was better than it could be. === The search for the pegasus foal lasted all afternoon. The search party had grown to more than a dozen pegasi to thoroughly search the sea for a small white cloud. The cloak was finally discovered blown ashore, empty of its passenger. Case files opened overnight, and the morning paper gave a small segment at the bottom of the front page, with officials begging for information of any kind to help investigate the disappearance of their young citizen. Despite the busy time of the event, few witnesses came forward, just like nopony had descended to break up the fight. As usual, accounts were conflicted on the palette of the other foals involved, and what had actually happened.