Chapter 108 - Research *
The second floor, home of the ‘filly-hating ghost’.
Trixie bit into her cucumber sandwich with a satisfying crispy crunch. She’d have liked it better if she’d gotten something a little less bland, but there was only so much she could expect from Flitter whenever she threw her out among the den of wolves that was the cafeteria lunch line.
Beside her, Flitter was staring at her untouched meal.
Flitter, to her credit, had been getting just a little bit better. That was to say, once she was finally in the queue, she had stopped nervously slipping out to head back to the end of the line. Something which Trixie had praised her endlessly for.
However, Trixie had noticed that Flitter hadn’t eaten well lately. She preferred to just stare down at her food with a vacant look. It was no use to ask her what was wrong, she never gave a straight answer, but Trixie had a good idea of what it was.
It had been nearly two weeks since the incident. Starlight still had not shown up for school.
Moon Rock had taken it upon herself to bring Starlight her homework each day, and Sunny Days encouraged the class to sign a get-well-soon card. Even Trixie and Flitter had signed it when Sunny came to their desk with it. If it had been anyone but Sunny, Trixie might have thought she was trying to guilt trip her for saying they weren’t really Starlight’s friends.
The first week, Starlight’s absence had worried Trixie just as much as it had worried Flitter. Trixie’s thoughts had even been plagued by ridiculous ideas, like apologizing to Starlight for protecting Flitter, or visiting her at home to see how she was doing. Fortunately, Trixie had the good sense to first visit the school nurse, Miss Tea, to ask about Starlight’s condition.
Originally, Miss Tea refused to tell her anything. After all, it wasn’t her business, but no mere adult could withstand The Great and Persuasive Puppy Dog Eyes. After feeding the nurse a tearful story about how worried she was, the nurse relented, and gave what she must have thought to be a reassuring answer to Trixie. Apparently, Starlight was just fine! According to the nurse, though Starlight did have a bloody nose for a day or two, she’d never broken anything! She was just at home to recover from the ‘shock’!
Trixie took another big, forceful, bite out of her sandwich. She still could hardly believe she’d ever been the least bit concerned for Starlight. All this time, the sooty simpleton had been taking advantage of a convenient excuse to skip school for a while. Trixie had practically given her a vacation! And felt bad about it! She glared at the window, imagining throwing the fool out of it when she got back just to retroactively make her ‘recovery’ worth it.
I’ll bet she had a good laugh when she saw I signed that card. I totally fell for it. Maybe it was a mistake to tell Flitter? She seems really broken up about it. Wouldn’t it make more sense to get angry?
It was difficult for Trixie to understand Flitter sometimes. She was so quiet and reserved in public, but blossomed when the two of them were alone. At least, usually she did. But, ever since Trixie had told her about Starlight’s trick, she was just so subdued.
“Moon Rock said that Starlight will be back this Friday,” Flitter said suddenly.
Trixie perked up. She didn’t remember Moon Rock saying anything of the sort in class. “She did? So she’s finally stopped faking it then.”
Flitter’s brow furrowed, though she stayed quiet, and just stared at her food. Trixie knew that expression.
A few weeks back Flitter had loaned a colt named Dew Hill two bits, and he’d never paid them back. Most likely he’d just forgotten about it. But every time Flitter spotted him on his own in class or at the lunch table, she’d stare at him, and furrow her brow. Then, when one of his friends joined him, she’d sigh and get on whatever she was doing previously, but as soon as she was alone with Trixie she’d rant, in her own way, about him forgetting the loan.
There was no doubt about it, that look meant Flitter had something to say, and felt she had found the perfect moment to say it. If only she could work up the courage to do so before the moment passed.
With bated breath, Trixie stayed completely still. Afraid that a single motion might make Flitter feel like her moment had passed. Silently, she waited for her friend to spill the beans.
“Uhm, Trixie?” Flitter asked quietly, hugging her legs against her own body. “…Are you sure she is faking it? W-what if the nurse just told you what you wanted to hear?”
Trixie quirked an eyebrow. I see. So that’s what was bugging her. She’s worried I’m jumping to conclusions. As if I would ever do that. “Trixie is sure that between the nurse and Starlight, Starlight is more likely to lie. Adults don’t lie. Besides, you know what she’s like. Hay, just think. These past two weeks nopony has bothered or teased us. And Starlight has been gone for two weeks. Therefore, Trixie would like to think that it must have been Starlight goading them into it.”
“I guess, but… well… You didn’t see her cry.”
It was true. Starlight was still in shock when Trixie had been ushered into the office, and she was gone by the time the professor was done. Only Flitter remained in the hallway. The story Flitter told afterward was that Starlight had broken down crying while Trixie was getting her ‘lecture’. Far too kind for her own good, Flitter had tried to help Starlight get to the nurses office, but was swiftly pushed into a wall for her efforts. After which, Starlight quickly left.
“No,” Trixie said. “Trixie has trouble picturing it to be honest.” She stroked a hoof along the brim of her hat nervously. “It’s just… I dunno… easier. To think she’s just a jerk, I mean.”
“Well, she probably is.” Flitter gave her a playful nudge, earning herself a smile from the great and powerful filly. “But, that doesn’t mean you have to be too. I, uhm, well I just think maybe… you really scared her. I was scared, and you were on my side.”
“Trixie isn’t sure if those are compliments or not.” She threw Flitter a cocky grin.
Frowning, Flitter pushed Trixie off balance. “You are awful! I meant maybe you scared her straight!”
Offering no resistance, Trixie sprawled across the floor. Getting comfortable on her back, she gazed up at the clouds through the windows. “Okay fine. I am sorry. I get it. It would be nice if maybe they left us alone now. I won’t start anything by saying she faked being hurt, that’s what you want, right?”
“Y-yes. I’d like that. Maybe we can all just… you know… ignore each other. I wanna be able to eat in the cafeteria again sometimes. W-without looking over my shoulder.”
Trixie nodded, bringing her gaze back down towards Flitter. “Fine. Trixie didn’t realize you weren’t satisfied having only the roof and second floor to ourselves.”
“T-that’s not it. It would just be nice, sometimes.” she grumbled cutely. Her eyes flicked to the door that lead to the professor’s office. “Isn’t your detention almost over? We can stop coming here then.”
“It is. Just two more days.” Blowing a lock of hair out of her face, Trixie folded her hooves below her head. “It was your idea to have our lunch here anyways. Shouldn’t you have been scared of the ghost like everypony else?”
Flitter smirked a little bit. “You are the ghost. I don’t mind you haunting me.” Flitter's face reddened several seconds later, impressing Trixie a bit. It takes a lot of red to get seen through a dark purple coat after all.
“Muhaha,” Trixie laughed, as eerily as she could manage. “Is that how a ghost would laugh? Wait, do ghosts laugh? I should find a book or something on that. Where do you suppose we could find one? Flitter?”
Flitter held her face in her hooves. Her ghostly laughter must have been too scary for her.
“Well, never mind. You should hurry and eat up. Class starts in a couple minutes.”
“R-right.” A reddish glow appeared around Flitter’s sandwich. It was an unsteady affair, but she still managed to bring it to her mouth for a bite.
Beaming with pride, Trixie clapped her hooves together enthusiastically. “That’s great, Flitter. You are getting better each time!” Within the red aura, Trixie watched the tapestry of Flitter’s magic weaving and churning. It was a strange sensation, something she could see, yet not see at the same time. “Try to… I dunno… ‘flow’ more slowly.”
“L-like this?” Flitter’s muzzle scrunched up while she tried to follow the very vague command.
Trixie shook her head. “No, that’s ‘drag’ It’s different. It’s like, uh, just keep trying stuff!” It was frustrating, but she didn’t have the words to describe it. So the only solution was to make them up herself, and try to convey what she meant through trial and error. “No. No. Try to, umm...angle it more? No… Mhm, no. Yeah! ...no, you lost it.”
After about the twelfth ‘no’, Flitter finally managed to change something which the sandwich shook a little bit less.
“Yes!” Trixie cheered.
“Thanks, it does feel better” Sweat running down her brow, Flitter smiled gratefully at Trixie while she brought her sandwich in for another bite. She managed exactly two bites before the aura flickered and petered out, dropped the sandwich in her hooves.
“Ah. Are you okay, Flitter?” She leaned in, her eyes focused on the filly’s horn. There wasn’t anything she knew of that she could do to help.
“I-I’m fine. It’s just… you know… really hard to change random things.” She wore a much more relaxed expression now that the bread was in her hooves.
“Oh, uh, do you want Trixie to stop asking you to?” Trixie rubbed her fetlocks along her foreleg nervously.
Flitter quickly shook her head. “No. It really helps. But, it’s just hard to change. That’s all. I learned the other changes, right? They are easy now. Uhm, well, as easy as magic can be anyway. I’ve got The Great and Powerful Trixie as a tutor, what could be better?” She beamed.
“That’s the spirit!” Trixie pulled a suddenly squirming Flitter against her and held out one hoof pointed towards the sky. “Today levitation. Tomorrow the world!”
The school bell announced that the world was done waiting for two tardy fillies.
“Trixie will be glad when this is over,” she said while climbing the stairs up to the second floor. School was over for the day, but for Trixie that merely meant it was time for detention.
Flitter followed alongside her. “Me too. It’s no fun going home alone… ”
Nodding silently, Trixie paused in front of the door that would lead into the professor’s creepy office, staring up at it with a sickly feeling in her stomach. The nerves right before going in were always the worst part, like stage fright.
It was nice of Flitter to accompany her there every day. It made Trixie at least a little more at ease, even if she had to leave right after dropping Trixie off. Trixie knew it was inconvenient for Flitter, not to mention frightening for the little scaredy-cat, but she did it anyway. It was great to have a good friend like her.
“S-so, uhm.” Flitter began, scratching her hoof along the floor. “This is it, then. I’ll see you tomorrow?” she said, staring at Trixie expectantly.
Trixie snapped back to reality. “Of course.” She smiled at Flitter and pulled her closer, planting a quick kiss on her cheek. As usual, Flitter didn’t return the gesture, but she was just like that. “Later, Flitter!” she said as confidently as she wished she felt, then entered the office.
The heavy door slammed shut behind her, but she only knew that because of the vibrations through the floor. The actual sound was completely gone. Trixie wasn’t sure how this spell was performed, but the entire office was deadly silent. She knew she should be hearing Flitter’s hoofsteps fading away, but it was gone too. As was her own breathing. Even the faint rustle of her hat against her mane each time she moved her head. All of it gone, like she wasn't even there. It never got any easier, even after two weeks she was not the least bit used to it. She didn't want to get used it, that feeling of not existing.
Trotting across the office, Trixie saw Professor Silence was already behind his desk. He was not exactly waiting for her. On his desk were today’s tests. They were the only thing he had eyes for. The way his quill struck out at the parchment was more like a scalpel than a writing instrument, carving out everything that he deemed wrong with his patient.
She nodded respectfully to him, even though he did not appear to be watching. Trixie didn’t want to take chances. She sat down on the small stool in front of the desk and waited to be acknowledged. It was a pointless bit of ritual, as it went the exact same each time. He was going to ignore her for a while, then tell her to do the same thing he always did.
There was very little she could do for entertainment while she waited. Maybe she'd finally work up the courage and bring that book next time. A school book of course. There was no way he could object to that, right? She wouldn’t be very entertained, but if she just pretended to be it might annoy the professor enough to hurry up.
Bored, she let her eyes roam along the office walls. It was still every bit as foreboding as it had been upon first glance, but Trixie found that the longer she looked, the less scary it became. The old globe in the corner was no different from the one they’d used in geography class at her old school. Well, a little dirtier maybe.
Similarly, the shelves were still full of books and scrolls. The scrolls were still a mystery, since she wasn’t about to grab one, but by now Trixie had had the time to actually read some of the spines. It wasn’t quite what she had expected.
None of the books were about how to hide your fangs, or endure sunlight. Instead, they were pretty normal books. There was a segment with history books, though Trixie could swear they were just for show, the professor was probably old enough to have witnessed the events. Two dictionaries, an atlas, and an almanac, all of which looked exceptionally boring.
Things picked up a little when Trixie discovered one shelve was dedicated to fiction, and even better, they were all books the librarian wouldn’t give to her yet. Books that her mom wouldn’t let her read because they were too scary. Even if Trixie wasn’t allowed to read the books, she knew of them. They were classic horror stories, with titles such as ‘Dracula’, ‘Frankenstein’, ‘The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde’, ‘The Raven’, and others which Trixie wasn’t as familiar with. It was strange to think that the professor actually had a hobby. Trixie had to wonder if he read them like normal ponies, or if he read them and rooted for the monster?
But the best books were —where else?— on the top shelves. Magic books. Some of them she recognized as their school books, including those for the coming years. ‘Magic 101’, ‘Magic 102’, but a bit further were titles she couldn’t even pronounce. They had odd symbols and letters, or maybe they were another language. Now that she thought about it, that could be what the dictionaries were for. She wanted to get her hooves on those someday, they were no doubt going to be interesting.
She caught a blur of motion from the corner of her eye, and quickly dragged her gaze away from the shelves.
Without raising his eyes from the parchment, the gloomy stallion gestured towards the crate in the corner of the room. Whatever attention he was affording her waned a moment later. Trixie didn’t bother to nod this time. They both knew she was perfectly aware of her task.
Stepping in front of the crate, Trixie glared down at her nemesis. The accursed box had been the bane of her existence for two weeks. On her first day of detention, she was told to lift the crate up for an hour. If she could do it, her detention would end immediately. She barely managed to lift it for a few seconds the first time.
With a smooth motion, she swiped her hat back, and sparked her exposed horn to life. She captured the crate in a gentle glow, then clenched her teeth as she focused on dragging it across the floor towards the middle of the room. How is this still this hard!? Every time, she was sure she would have a much easier time with the weight, and every time, she’d sorely overestimated herself somehow.
Clenching her teeth, Trixie willed the crate up into the air, forcing it to slowly rise toward the ceiling. It felt so heavy. Just the mere effort it took her to get it into the air would have killed a lesser pony, or so Trixie liked to think.
Today was going to be the day! She had been at this task for two weeks. It was downright embarrassing that she still could not do it! She was The Great and Powerful Trixie for crying out loud! Over the course of her detention: she had shaved every useless little thread from the telekinesis spell, but that only brought her up to five minutes of levitation. A far cry from the hour she required. She’d practiced day in and day out, Which had gotten her another five minutes. She had even taken time out of her day to observe other unicorns as they lifted objects around town. Her fellow students, teacher, construction workers, random passerby’s who’s groceries ‘mysteriously’ fell out of their bags. Trixie had closely observed their magic techniques. It had taken a lot of effort, copying what she deemed usable, refining what worked, experimenting with different approaches she’d seen, and of course practicing even more until she was too exhausted to even use her magic for anything else anymore. She’d even taken to eating lunch with her hooves again just to save up energy.
Trixie glared up at the crate as she held it aloft, sweat already ran down her forehead as she fought to keep her hold on the thing. It didn’t make any sense. She was the best. She KNEW she was the best. Of course, she had thought she was the best two weeks ago too, when she could barely push a notebook across a desk. But this was different, she had really worked on this. Originally, it was just about escaping detention early, but now… NOW it was personal. It was a battle between The Great and Powerful Trixie and Cratos —she had decided her nemesis needed a cool name— and she was going to win this time!
What time was it? Her legs were getting shaky. She knew that logically it didn’t make any sense, she was not actually using them. It had to be at least forty minutes, right? She really should have glued a clock to the crate before she started.
The important thing was she was doing it! She held the accursed Cratos captive in her gaze through sheer force of will, and momentous effort. She’d never allow him to soil the ground again in her presence! At least not for an hour. She wasn’t even tired. Well, not extremely tired anyway. Only like super tired.
The clattering sound of a pencil falling to the floor echoed through the otherwise unnaturally silent office. It rolled against her hoof.
That couldn’t be right, why was there sound now?
“Ah,” Professor Silence said with a trifling hint of amusement. “Miss Lulamoon, would you get that for me? I can’t see it from here.”
He had to be kidding! She was in the middle of something here! Barely suppressing a growl, Trixie quickly glanced away from the crate to glare at the professor. There was a wooden cup on his desk that held numerous pencils. One which Trixie knew had not been there any of the other times she’d been in his office.
No sooner had she looked away than she felt the magic holding up the crate falter. Screaming, she leapt out of the way barely a second before the heavy crate slammed into the ground with a deafening thud. Or at least it sounded really loud after not hearing anything at all for a while. Her heart beat in her throat while she stared at the heavy crate, occupying the exact spot she’d been just a second ago.
That was close! Why was it above her? Did she do that? Wait, how long had it been? There was a clock on the wall behind her she could check.
Twenty minutes. Twenty lousy minutes. That was the fruit of her labor.
Open-mouthed, Trixie stared at the lying, dastardly clock. Until she heard Professor Silence clearing his throat. At once, she whirled around and pointed a hoof at him. “You! What!? Why?!”
The professor looked up from his desk, wearing a disapproving expression. “Do try to adhere to the basic rules of sentence structure, Miss Lulamoon.” A thin smile played on his lips when Trixie closed her mouth and puffed up her cheeks. “Did you acquire the pencil? I do re—”
“You sabotaged Trixie!” She screamed at the top of her lungs.
Rising up from his chair, he leaned forward over the desk. “Sabotaged?” he echoed, and stared back at her. Besides him, a parchment unfolded while the quill jotted down something that Trixie couldn’t see. “I merely asked you to pick up a pencil.” As he spoke, the pencil raised from the ground, and floated in front of her as though to demonstrate he was speaking the truth.
Her blood boiled. In all the time she’d been here, he had never even had a pencil in the room. “You don’t even use those! You can’t just distract Trixie like that!”
“Why?” His eyes never strayed from her own.
Trixie was quickly coming to realize who she was yelling at, and that this might not be the best of ideas. Still, some far bigger part of her was screaming inside with outrage over being asked such a stupid question right after being nearly killed! Let alone interrupted. “Because the spell will fail! You can’t do two things at once!”
The professor stayed quiet, and merely quirked an eyebrow at her. He slumped back into his chair and pressed his hooves together. He seemed to be waiting for something, though Trixie couldn’t hazard a guess as to what it could be.
The quiet scribbling of the quill was grating Trixie’s last nerve. What could he even be writing? They were both just staring at each other.
It was strange, why did he decide to mess with her now? She only had two days left. If he was going to mess with her, why not start immediately? And why did that stupid pencil keep floating into her field of view no matter where she craned her neck to look around it?
Fed up, Trixie raised a hoof to smack the pencil away, but froze mid swing. She stared at the floating pencil, while in the background she clearly still heard the pencil scribbling. Slowly panning her gaze back towards the table, she watched the quill dancing across the page.
“…Two?” Trixie breathed in disbelief.
He wasn’t even looking at either of them, she knew for a fact he’d locked eyes with her this entire time.
“An astute observation,” he said. The pencil placed itself back into the wooden cup with its brothers, and the quill halted. “Did you think yourself master of telekinesis, merely because you could lift a crate? Please, you could not even look away without losing control.”
Trixie felt her face burn up. Was he a mind reading vampony after all? Or had he just guessed by her attitude? “That’s not true! Trixie has carried her books without looking!” She stomped her hoof.
To Trixie’s unending satisfaction, that actually caused the briefest glimpse of surprise to flash across the professor’s face. Though he looked disinterested a mere second later, Trixie had already decided she was going to count that as a victory.
“Trixie will be taking her break now.” She announced, then turned to leave the office.
She was prepared to ignore him if he tried to tell her to stop, but all she heard while walking away was the sound of the quill resuming its duty. Technically, she had to do anything he told her to her to do during her detention. She’d just assumed the only thing she had to do was lift the crate since he’d never given her any other orders, until today anyway.
It was a dirty trick, to make her drop her guard until he could distract her at the last moment. When she thought about it, she couldn’t even really object to him doing it again, which just made it even nastier.
When she was out of the office, all the sound dropped away again before she could slam the door.
She slammed it anyway.
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Pretty quick update.
I think this is supposed to be Flitter talking.
The great and persuasive puppy dog eyes was great.
5668518
Honestly, its the other way around. The last update was late, because i was agonizing over whether or not to seperate the Trixie filly timeline it its own story or not. Since it is getting some chapters right now and i know not everyone is overly interested in that timeline. Turns out that due to the site rules, doing so is significantly more trouble then it is worth right now anyways though.
You're right, fixed, thanks. Though it sure would have been funny if it was Starlight just showing up out of nowhere.
*IOU 1: Trixie puppy dog eye pic when i get back to my pc.*
5668579 I originally thought starlight showed up, I had to go back and re read it. Regardless the 2 updates close together was nice. Splitting up the timelines wouldn't be a bad idea. I would still read both, but some people might might not want to read one or the either.
oooooh boy would you ever, Trix
5668579
Typos
___1
Flitters face reddened several seconds later,
Flitter's
___2
No sooner had she looked away, or she felt the magic holding up the crate falter.
away that she (I’m not sure if ‘that’ is the right word there… but ‘, or’ doesn’t look correct to me...)
___3
Her heart beat in her throat while she stared at heavy crate,
at the heavy
___
I'd say keep the story all together; since these backstory chapters flow together with the current timeline, effectively showing the readers Trixie's state of mind through her dreams, it'd be pretty inconvenient to say 'stop reading this story at chapter 102 and go read chapters 8 and 9 of the side story then come back and read chapter 103 through 110 then go back to the side story and read chapter 10 then come back here for chapter 111 through 125 then... etc. etc.'. Even if you have it as 'read the backstory here and read the present timeline here' that wouldn't really work because it takes away from showing the readers Trixie's mindset throughout her recovery.
Yeah since these chapters are relevant to telling this one story keep it all as one story here please.
Yep, there’s a difference between many light objects and trying to split attention between a heavy one and something else. I hope Trixie shows him up soon.
5668800
Sorry for causing confusion like that.
Thanks for your input. Maybe I'll compromise, and put some sort of indicator in the chapter title to make it clear what timeline it will be in.
Also, the IOU:
derpicdn.net/img/2014/11/6/759522/large.png
5668968
Maybe just a little bit, in very reasonable situations.
5669093
Thanks for pointing those out. Fixed.
The "no sooner" thing turned out to be a bit more complicated than I thought.
Apparently the right phrase to go with is "Than" http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/no+sooner+than
Interesting.
Thanks for your input. That was actually a big part of what I was agonizing over. I wasn't convinced I'd done a good job of tying the two timelines together, but I feel much better about it after reading this. I may end up compromising, and put some sort of indicator in the chapter titles. That seems a reasonable accommodation.
5669698
Exactly. It's tricky business. Fortunately, Tricky business is what Trixie does best.
derpicdn.net/img/view/2012/12/1/169472__safe_trixie_spoiler-colon-s03e05_smug_artist-colon-mental-dash-mischief.jpg
She may have to study abroad for this one though:
derpicdn.net/img/2014/11/8/760553/large.png
...Okay, I'll admit that was a thinly veiled excuse just to post that pic, but I couldn't not post it after stumbling across it.
5669837
Glad I could give you that excuse. And yes, Trixie is good a tricky business
.
5669837 don't worry about the confusion, typos happen. man that's a cute picture
5691505
You remembered right, Starlight is a blankflank.
Also, damn. Let's not go around dehorning all the unicorn fillies that act like a brat at some point or we'd have none left.
Quick, grab a shovel, Trixie!
6148955
Huh, I usually get the reference. Let's see what "Cratos Shovel" turns up on google.
...
Hah! Oh my goodness. I had no idea this was a thing.
cdn.gamerant.com/wp-content/uploads/Shovel-Knight-Kratos-Battle-700x350.jpg
I'll admit, I skimmed through the end of this chapter since I don't care much about filly!Trixie, even less about professor Survivalofthefittest and even moar less about school.
Comments;
Well, not without punching her in the face at least.
You're in for a big disappointment, Trixie.
orig12.deviantart.net/000b/f/2014/139/a/0/flying_dino_by_epulson-d7iww46.png