//------------------------------//
// Done Right By The Dead 
// Story: Stars In The Day 
// by NightInk 
//------------------------------//

	“You’re going to have to lay that out for me,” I said. “You mean I’m dead? If I’m dead, shouldn’t I be at the Crossroads?”
Discord was busy laughing like this was the funniest thing he had ever seen. “Oh, ho! You should all see the looks on your faces!” he wheezed, conjuring a mirror in front of each of us. I didn’t think the empty mirror in front of me was very funny. As he laughed, I focused on transforming into an alicorn. As my bones reshaped themselves, I did my best to keep sight of Discord, who was busy rolling on the sky, holding his sides. As soon as the transformation was finished, I began to focus a magic blast into my horn.
“Hey!” I yelled, finally getting his attention. “If I’m dead, why am I not at the Crossroads?!”
He came down to the ground, wiping a tear of mirth from his eye. “I never said you were dead, just that your spirit was detached from your body. And you should really put away that horn before you hurt yourself. But wait, you can’t anymore. Oops!” Finally catching the deadly glint in my eyes, he put up his hands. “All right, all right. I may have rigged the mountain so that there were some magical rocks about three quarters of the way through that were supposed to put you in the most incredible torment you’d ever experienced. It was supposed to stop you. It’s stopped everyone else I ever used it on. But you pushed through it, you big burly man!” he exclaimed, pretending to hit me on the shoulder.
“If I lost my body inside the mountain, why was I able to keep digging?” I asked, not getting any happier.
Discord shrugged. “Now that I don’t know. I guess that those hammers of yours are tangible in both the mortal and spiritual realms. Whoever gave them to you has some good foresight.”
Allowing myself to admit I couldn’t hit Discord as I was, I stopped preparing a missile, instead turning my face to the sky, smiling. John was smarter than he let on. I brought my gaze back down to Discord. “I beat your game even after you cheated, so put me back into my body. Now.”
“Ooh, so touchy. But to be quite honest, I don’t know how,” he said, doing his best to look innocent.
“Why don’t I believe you?” Luna asked, her horn beginning to glow. “He may not be able to attack you, but I can. So tell us.”
“Look, princess,” Discord said, suddenly sounding angry and sarcastic. “I only use the magic. I don’t know how to reverse it, and I’ve never really cared. There’s probably some way to do it buried in the Crossroads, somewhere. Where exactly, I don’t know. So go ahead and pull your husbands body from the mountain and figure it out on your own, because I don’t know and I’m not planning on helping.” As he finished talking, he did a quick midair summersault and vanished.
“Well, shoot,” Applejack muttered. “Now what do we do? I ain’t ever even heard of this Crossroads place. He seemed to think ya’ll knew about it, though. Is that where you went to get your other hammer earlier?”
“Yeah, it is, and now I’m going to have to go back and find a way to either get back into my body or make a new one around my spirit. I guess I’ll ask Ben and John if they know when I get there.”
“Wait a minute darling,” Rarity said. “What exactly is the Crossroads, Who is Ben, and are we going to be able to help? By we, I mean all six of us.”
“Yeah, an’ we can all help too!” Apple Bloom shouted. The three fillies all hoof-bumped and shouted “Cutie Mark Crusaders Spirit Savers!! Yay!!”
“Oh, no. Ya’ll are grabbing the train home and heading straight to the farm,” AppleJack said sternly. “No little sis of mine is gonna be runnin off to someplace that could be all manner of dangerous!”
“Yes, and Sweetie Bell, you are to accompany her. Who knows what kind of filth could be there, and you would undoubtedly get your mane in a terrible muss!” Rarity added.
“Well, for starters, I think you guys should know where it is you’re calling dirty and dangerous,” I cut in. “So, don’t freak out, but… The Crossroads is where the dead go to choose their place in the afterlife.” The next ten minutes or so were just AJ and Rarity screaming. I don’t even remember what about. Something about the safety and cleanliness of their sisters and Scootaloo, then I tuned it out. I let them get it out of their systems before I continued. “We never told you that we could travel freely to and from there because of exactly this. And the risk of unleashing Pinkie Pie on the realm of the dead.” Both ponies nodded and muttered in agreement. “And it’s not a dangerous place, the people there are like I am now, unable to do any physical harm. It’s not dirty, it’s very well kept. Ben keeps the place nice.” Luna nodded and smiled understandingly at the two unconvinced mares in front of us.
“The point is we know what we’re doing. Or at least he does. Maybe. Even if he were to bring the girls into the Crossroads, which he won’t,” she added, giving me a stern glare. “They would be perfectly safe. Just trust us. Now, the five of you are going to go back to Ponyville, and we are going to figure out how to make Adam fully alive again. Ok?”
Rarity and AJ muttered something in agreement and quickly began to take the fillies home. Luna turned back to me and began to ask more questions herself. “So, do you know who to talk to? I mean, where do we go?”
“We don’t go anywhere,” I stated. Before continuing, I changed back into my regular, human self. “I’m going to let Celestia back over here, and you two are going to help the others beat Discord while I’m gone.” She started to protest, but I just held up my hand and shook my head. “Nope. End of story. Now, I’m going to go talk to the other relatively dead people. You go help the still living.”
“You know, there are better times to start being manly,” she said with a smile.
“You know, I would be more upset by that if you were more feminine,” I retorted. “I mean, a little balance is nice. Just saying.”
Rolling her eyes, she just said “Wooow. I’d leave now if I were you, just to make sure I don’t make you permanently dead.”
As I was getting ready to go, Scootaloo spoke back up. “Hey, how come you’re right front hoof that isn’t really a hoof isn’t all scary and bony?”
Not quite understanding, I looked at her for a moment before really reacting. “What do you mean? My hand is normal-” I started, looking at it myself. But looking at it, I realized that she was right. My hand was like it used to be. In a spirity way, it was perfect again. It was whole and fleshy, and it even had all the scars of my past. The skin wasn’t torn up and burnt like it would have been had the arm been there when I went through the mountain, and like the other arm still was even in spirit, but it just like I had remembered it. There were the scars from my years going camping, my few experiences trying to go rock climbing. I didn’t realize just how different it had felt when I had lost it, but I could feel the exhausted spiritual muscles in the left arm over the freshly made ones in the right. I flexed it a few times, just feeling the muscles and tendons pulling against each other. Applejack gave a low whistle; Rarity swooned and fell onto the grass (No one bothering to catch her). AppleBloom and Sweetie Bell let out breathless ‘wow’s, and Luna gaped for a second before smiling. “Adam, that is incredible.”
“Yeah, no kidding. If I were deep and spiritual and goofy, I would say that since I haven’t stopped living like my arm was normal, my spirit has retained it. But, me being me, I’m not going to think about this and go headlong into it without considering any consequences.”
Luna laughed and shook her head. “Yes, dear, that sounds like you. Now, come on. You need to get ready for whatever is next. Do you want your hammers?”
“Oh, yes, thank you honey. And would you drag my body out of the mountain? It should be three quarters of the way in there. It ought to be easy to spot. Can you just keep it safe until I can repossess it?”
“Oh, honey, of course I can do that. But I’m going to have to do that later, I need to take the girls to the train station. They could use some help with Rarity.”
“Yeah, that’s ok, just get to it soon. I’ll bring you something nice from the Crossroads. God, I hate these business trips. They’re so draining, and they’re never any fun. They need to spruce that place up. Maybe put some banners up, some streamers. Ooh, a bar.. Or a strip club.”
“All right, that isn’t funny,” she said, growing grim for all of six seconds. “Now, behave yourself while you’re down there. Stay safe, don’t be stupid, be polite, and don’t make the wrong people angry.” As she spoke, she tried to walk me through the motions of fixing my suspenders by gesturing with her hands.
“So, you want me to be a totally different person?” I asked, fixing everything she gestured for me to. “I mean, those are my joys in life, and true talents. I’m good at doing stupid things, things that aren’t safe, and mouthing off. Just ask Tia,” I finished with a wink.
“Yes, but you’ll do good because I asked you to,” she said, giving me the once over and smiling once she decided that I was presentable enough to be half-dead.
Laughing, I picked up the hammers and threw the portal into position, and as I walked through, I almost ran into John Henry.

…

John stood with his arms crossed proudly. Ben had put down his knife and fish and was nodding in approval. Celestia just sat, looking like she wasn’t sure whether or not to be happy or sad. I wasn’t expecting anyone to be right there when I came through, so I almost backed back through the portal again. John put his hand on my shoulder.
“My boy, that was truly impressive.” He grinned from ear to ear. “Never in my days would ah have believed that a man could be shredded on the spiritual level and still be fighting for his family in the way you did.”
“Yeah, no joke,” Ben added. “I don’t even think I could have done that.”
“You know, I hate to be the voice of reason, but isn’t you’re new… Condition a problem?” Celestia brought us back to reality.
“Yeah, that’s been my thought,” I admitted. “I haven’t been really thinking about being strong as I need to get a body back. And then I have to get back to help my wife.”
“Fair enough,” John said. “But ah don’t know anything about gluing a soul back into a body. Or making a new body for a soul. Ben?”
“Yeah, see, I don’t know about that either. Only guy who knows about that is crazy old guy down the center road. No one knows his real name anymore; he changes it every time you ask. The most consistent answer given is Legba.”
“Umm… So, that’s really your play? Send me to your local nut?”
“Yeah, kind of. But he really knows his curses and stuff,” he said.
“So, you’re sending me to a scary voodoo guy? Dude, you’re letting me down here.”
“You know what, I’m trying to help. Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud of you for having finished after quasi-dead, but maybe you should stop getting dead or almost,” he spat. “I’m tired of being a bad guy or the guy you go to when you’re in trouble!”
We all stood in a stunned silence. Obviously that was way out of character for him. Celestia put a hoof gently of his shoulder. “Don’t you think that’s a little harsh?” she said quietly. “Adam just wants to get back to his wife and my sister. I’d feel like he does if I were just a spirit too.”
Ignoring the nagging feeling that Celestia was crushing on Death, I nodded. “Yeah, I’m sorry. I’m tired of being dead at inconvenient times. I’ll talk to this guy. Center road, right?” Ben nodded once and looked at the ground. “Dude, don’t feel bad. I get it. And Celestia, speaking of your sister, you need to get back to Equestria.”
Celestia looked down sadly at the ground. “Yeah, I know.” She gave Ben a pat on the leg. Yeah, that was going to be weird for a while. “I will see you when you are fully alive again,” she said, wrapping a wing around me as she passed. “Please hurry,” she said as she stepped through the still open portal.
I pulled down the portal and turned back to the others. “All right, so are you guys coming with me, or what? I need my body. Or a reasonable substitute.”
Ben shook his head and picked up his knife and fish and went back to working. “I can’t. Someone has to always be here to welcome the dead to their rest, and I don’t have a backup in place right now.”
John rubbed his arm awkwardly. “Yeah, and Polly Ann has got some dinner in the oven. And she gets upset when ah chase after creepy old men with mah half dead descendants.”
I nodded understandingly. “Yeah, I get it. Wait, what? You mean you’d gone after this guy with other descendants?”
“Uh, no, but she gets upset when ah’m late at all, so this wouldn’t be any kind of difference.”
I gave him a blank stare. “Really? I mean, it’s great that you’re going to go be with your wife for dinner like she wants, but seriously?!” I took a deep breath so that I didn’t say something stupid. “All right. It’s all good, you both have your duties.”
“Ah, ha-ha-ha! He said duty!” John bellowed.
Ben laughed a little and explained. “That’s still funny down here. It hasn’t been as overused as in the living world.”
“Gotcha. Well, this has been odd. Thank you both very much. Center road?” Ben simply nodded and began to focus on his carving again, but John put his hand on my shoulder.
“Yer probably tired of hearing me talk, but just know that you’re doing right by every good person in any world. This is what makes you truly strong. Not muscles or brawn. It’s strength of spirit.”
I put a hand on his and gave him a stupid grin. “Yeah, but muscles sure helped you out.”
“Ha, ha. Well, I’m still down here. You can get back up there. Keep using my hammer well. You’ll get back to that pretty woman of yours.” He gave me a pat and slowly went back down his road. Ben and I gave each other an acknowledging nod, and I was on my way.

…

I don’t know how the other Crossroads look, but the center road is a bit odd, once you walk a while. At first the ditches glow orange and streetlights begin to line the sides again, but after a while things begin to look bleaker. The lights get a little dimmer, the trees thin out, and pretty soon there aren’t any trees at all. The darkness just goes on forever. Pretty soon, you come to a lake. It kind of glows from the bottom, giving it a dull, eerie shine. It’s not bright, exactly, just kind of creeps a guy the hell out.
On the shore of the lake was a dock that looked like it hadn’t seen any maintenance in eons. On it sat an old man, a fishing pole in his hand and an old walking stick stuck in the ground next to him. He hummed quietly to himself, without a real tune or melody. He didn’t seem to notice me as I approached; he just kept humming and fishing. Once I was close enough to carry a conversation, though, he suddenly stopped humming, dropped his fishing pole, stood, and faced me, taking up his staff again.
“Well, hello there. Are you new to the Crossroads, or just visiting?” His voice sounded like an old man who wasn’t quite all there. I was right. “Did you come for the party?”
“Uh, no I didn’t. And last I knew, people didn’t just visit the Crossroads. Dead people stay dead.”
“Dead people? Of course they do. No one ever comes back to the dead. It’s not possible. No can do. What was your name again?”
“I’m Adam,” I said, slowly putting my good hand out. “What was yours?”
“Oh, my name is Larry. What’s your name?” he asked, shaking my hand.
“Uh, I already told you, my name is Adam. It’s nice to meet you, Larry.”
“Who’s Larry? My name is Legba. It’s nice to meet you Aaron,” he said, cocking his head slightly.
“Um, it’s Adam. So, I’ve been told that you know how to reunite a spirit. Is that true?”
“Oh, no. Not possible. Once you open your popcorn, the un-popped kernels cannot be re-microwaved.”
I was beginning to get uncomfortable trusting my soul to this guy. “Um, what does that have to do with reconnecting a spirit to its body?”
“Oh, you can do that easy!” he exclaimed. “All it takes is the right kind of voodoo spell.”
“I thought voodoo didn’t really work though. I get that magic is real, but voodoo?”
“Oh, no. voodoo is a very real source of magic. It’s actually the greatest source of magic available on Earth. If you hadn’t made it to Equestria, you may very well have stumbled upon it yourself. You have very strong magic emanating from you.”
It was getting weird. Everything he said was contradictory to everything else, and he knew stuff he shouldn’t have, like I was from earth and lived in Equestria part time. “Um, well, then, can you tell me how? I really need to be recombined with my body so that I can save my wife, friends, and the world from eternal chaos.”
“Oh, do you now? We had a fellow like that down here once. He had a funny name too. MoonSwirl… StarSpin… StarShip… No… that was a band…” He looked thoughtful for a moment like it was going to bug him for a while.
“You mean StarSwirl? StarSwirl the Bearded?” I better not have to deal with him for long.
“Yes! That was him! Nice fellow. A bit dark. Good woodcarver.”
“Huh… Sounds like someone I know… Who is that… Wait, we need to stay focused! I really need to get my soul back into my body. My wife really, really needs me. What spell do I need to cast to re-secure myself in my body?”
He shook his head and muttered something before answering. “No, no, it’s not that easy. To help a lost soul find its way again, it takes great power, and great cheese.”
Face-palming, I just sighed. “All right, pal, I get that you’re trying to help out, but cheese isn’t going to help me get back to my own body.”
His expression not changing from his semi-absent look, he tilted his head in the other direction. “And just how do you know that? Have you ever re-possessed your body before?”
“No, I just made a new one when I came back from the dead.”
“Well, then, you don’t know quite what it takes, now do you?”


This was going to be a long day.