Private Investigations
That night sleeping was nearly impossible as I thought through the implications of what I had found out. Finding out the relationship between the filly in the castle, and the Princesses of the kingdom was one thing, but that the kind ponies I had met may have had something to do with it as well was hard to handle. There is definitely more to this story, but I’m not sure if it’s because it was left out or if it was just something else she didn’t know. I actually hope it’s the latter as it would make things much easier to deal with since I’m pretty sure Fluttershy at least would do something to help if asked, though most of the others probably would as well if they could.
Thinking on this I decide that it would be best to keep this a secret, as Twilight would most likely let the Princess know due to an obligation to her teacher. The rest would probably be unable to hold the information from Twilight either because of their friendship. If any of them would be able to keep a secret though, it would be Pinkie Pie strangely enough as she seems good about keeping promises. That’s assuming if any of the others believe something so wild from her in the first place.
Eventually I was able to fall asleep, only noticing that I did because of seeing it dark outside one moment and light the next. Blinking at the sudden change I just start getting on with the day. Figuring that the situation is too complicated to solve quickly I decide to just wait and see what happens. Finishing the usual morning routines I head out to check on my garden.
Checking on things I am glad to find that the emeralds have been doing a decent job keeping the plants healthy. While the enchantment on them is nowhere near good enough to actually grow crops on their own, it is still strong enough to keep them healthier than usual, and probably could even help dying plants recover. Moving on to the small trees that the kumquats are growing on I notice something odd.
While most of the trees have a decent number of fruits on them I notice that one on the end is currently bare. Staring at it for about a minute I notice that it is also slightly rustling as if something is in it. It takes me a moment to notice that I can sense a pony in the area, though none entered the property recently which can mean only one thing I’ve found.
“Pinkie Pie, why are you raiding my garden?” At my words the pink party pony of Ponyville pops her primary protuberance out of the plant. She tries to say something, but it is garbled as she is still chewing on her ill-gotten fruits. I wait patiently for her to finish chewing before trying to get her to answer again.
“I couldn’t help myself I came by to visit yesterday and you weren’t home and when I checked back here I found these and I couldn’t help but try one as they looked tasty and I was right so I had another and another and I couldn’t stop myself and…” I sigh as I plant a hoof in her mouth to get her to stop her barrage of words. “I guess I should have expected that you’d be the first to find out about these, though maybe next time you should ask before raiding somepony else’s garden.”
I just look at her until she finally nods and I remove my hoof from her mouth. “Just limit yourself to this one tree at least if you are going to keep doing this.” Knowing that stopping her would be nearly impossible I decide that this would be the most I can get her to accept. “Sure thing Flarie, though how did you get all this to grow during the winter anyways? Nopony else ever grows anything outside this time of the year because of the cold and snow but you seem to be doing it without that being a problem.”
I had wondered why I never saw anypony else with a garden or even a greenhouse yet. “Well I picked up a few tricks and learned what kind of things still grew during the winter, though usually in areas with less snow during winter. So using that and some magic to keep the area clear of it as well as warm it up I could keep a few things growing. I guess a greenhouse would make things a bit easier, though.” Pinkie Pie just stares at me as I explain this, “Uh-huh… Okie Dokie Lokie.” She then proceeds to bounce her way back towards town carrying the few fruits she picked and didn’t eat.
Of course as soon as she was out of sight she somehow popped back up from out of another nearby plant. “Oh yeah, how about chocolate pineapple swirl?” I still wonder how she does that, even the link with the hearth stone doesn’t help figure that out. “No Pinkie, that’s not the correct flavor either.” She makes a snapping sound with something before vanishing back into the plant. “At least I can say nothing gets very boring with her around.”
Gathering up what is currently ready from the garden I pack up some of it for later meals, some for storage, and the rest as a gift later today. Picking up my packs from inside the house I head towards the town and try to decide who would be best to try and find out what happened that one day. I could have asked Pinkie Pie since she was here, though the chances of getting a sensible answer would have been low.
Suddenly an idea comes to mind, “Why ask them directly when I could go to a more talkative source that also won’t hold anything back? Spike probably knows most of what happened, and if I have to I can go to one of the others afterwards. Besides, knowing Twilight he could probably use a break around now.” With the plan in mind I make my way towards the library.
Like I expected Spike was busy cleaning the place up, though Twilight was nowhere around. Spike noticed me enter and paused in his work. “Hey Flarenza, Twilight’s busy down in her lab but if you need anything just let me know.” Huh, I wonder what kind of lab work she does down there, though that makes things a bit easier. “Actually I was hoping to talk with you about something I’ve been curious about.”
This surprises the young dragon, “Talk with me? About what?” I take a seat at one of the table scattered around the place and set out some things to snack on from my packs. “Well when I first arrived here in town I noticed a small parade coming from the Everfree Forest. In it were Twilight and her friends as well as the two Princesses. Yet I heard that the younger one had been missing for a long time so I’ve been curious about the story behind what happened.”
Spike rolls his eyes after I finished talking. “Oh that, a lot of ponies have asked about what happened out there. At least now we have an updated history book so I don’t have to keep explaining it.” I raise an eyebrow at his exasperated tone as he goes to find the book he was talking about. As he brings it over to me I toss him a couple small orange fruits in thanks before I start reading.
It doesn’t take me long to find what I was looking for as I had read the previous edition of the book. From it I learned a general example of what happened that day when I first arrived. From the arrival of Nightmare Moon, to Twilight and her friend’s trip to the castle where they found the Elements of Harmony, to the eventual defeat of Nightmare Moon and redeeming of Princess Luna it explained a few questions I had that night, though not the most important ones.
Nowhere is mentioned of the existence of another sister to the two Princesses. Looks like I may actually have to ask one of them about the full story of what happened there. I wonder what the Elements of Harmony are though, it sounds like it was something hidden at the castle that they found and it was used to defeat Nightmare Moon so the might have something to do with what happened. It’s also interesting that the castle was originally home to the two Princesses as well.
As I am about to call for Spike again I notice the door to what I assume is the basement open and a slightly smoking Twilight come through it. “Spiiike! If you need me I’ll be in the shower and- Oh Flarenza, when did you get here?” She stops as she notices me at the table. “I arrived not too long ago. I was looking up some things I had been wondering about for a while. What happened to you to leave your mane smoking?”
Twilight seems to get really nervous about this as she answers. “Well, uh I was working on some things in my lab, testing out a few spells actually and I kind of, blew up one of the gems you made, eh he.” I just stare at her blankly. “You blew up a gem? I’m assuming it was one of the heating ones considering the smoke.” She just nods at this while looking embarrassed. I shake my head at her and bring a hoof up to my face.
“I’ll probably regret this, but I’ll stay around to find out what you did after you get cleaned up.” She quickly makes her way out of the room as I sit there wondering what happened. She is probably the first pony I’ve seen to be able to somehow blow up one of the gems I made on accident. I better make sure to keep the stronger ones away from her; she’d probably take out part of the town if she tried whatever she did with those ones.
Spike comes out to see what Twilight wanted and I let him know. Seeing as it is nearing lunch and I might be there for a while I offer him some of the things I brought with me to work with which he graciously accepts and brings back into the kitchen. He’s a rather decent cook for being a dragon; though I guess with Twilight around he’d have to be. I chuckle at some of the things I’ve heard about her kitchen adventures while I wait.
Eventually she returns from cleaning up and Spike brings out lunch for the three of us. Twilight is surprised at the freshness of the kale and sweet potatoes. “Spike where did you get these from? I didn’t know we had anything this fresh still.” Spike just continues eating but points his fork at me causing her to roll her eyes. “I should have guessed you somehow keep surprising me with how creative you get with your spells. What is it this time, something to stop food from aging?”
I just chuckle at her before answering. “Nothing like that, it’s just fresh picked from my garden this morning, even though it was infested by pink ponies this morning.” Her jaw drops at this as she tries to process this information. I decide to answer the unasked question before she asks. “No it’s not anything too special, just a barrier to keep what I don’t want in it out and a few gems to regulate temperatures. This is temporary until I get a real greenhouse set up so I don’t have to expend so much energy on it.”
Twilight looks thoughtful at this, though it seems I forgot a question. “Well I guess that makes sense, though what do you mean by it being infested by pink ponies? What would Pinkie Pie be doing in your garden?” In answer I just toss her one a kumquat from out of my pack. Her eyes widen at the sight of it, “Wait, you are able to grow these out here? That’s incredible; normally the palace and other places in Canterlot have to import these from Zebrica. Last I saw they were selling for 2 bits per fruit and those didn’t look as fresh as these.”
My eyes widen at this as I didn’t expect them to be that expensive. “I didn’t realize that they’d be worth that much. I guess Pinkie Pie is lucky I didn’t know that or else I wouldn’t have given her free access to one of the trees.” I think that shocked Twilight into silence as we all finished up the meal silently from there. As Spike leaves with the dishes Twilight levitates over some notes on what she was doing downstairs in her lab.
“Well now that you’re cleaned and lunch is over, how about telling me how you managed to blow up one of those gems I made?” Twilight nods at this with a hint of a blush. “Well I was trying to figure out how you put the spells into place on it so that I could try and enhance the strength of it for other uses. I was able to find out the pattern that your spells set up inside the gem as well as how it links into its power storage.”
She pauses to see if I understand what she is saying and I nod. “Well seeing as it wasn’t something in any of my books I had to figure out how it all worked. I was able to drain the energy in the gem so that I could separate it from the rest of the spell and I worked outwards from there. I thought if I shrank the pattern down and then extended it out further that it would increase the power of the spell, which I guess it did, but it shouldn’t have been enough to cause it to blow up like it did when I recharged it.”
I look through her notes and immediately find what went wrong and I point it out. “I see where you made a mistake; you thought the pattern was all the same spell which it wasn’t.” Twilight is shocked by this and pulls out the drawing of the pattern she made. “There is actually a second effect that is caused by part of the pattern and that is to regulate the power use. When you shrank down the initial part you also reduced how well it could control the power, so when you recharged it…”
Twilight realizes what I’m getting at. “So when I recharged it instead of it using a small and steady flow like it was meant to it instead drew all the power out at once.” She brings a hoof up to her face at this. “That’s why I couldn’t find it; I was only looking for one spell, not two.” She starts to go through her notes while writing up a new page with these findings. I help out here and there as gets stuck, but eventually she runs out of steam on this and she remembers why I was originally there.
“So what were you looking for anyways?” She asks while looking at the history book that is still sitting nearby. “Well I was looking into some more recent history, specifically on what happened the day I arrived in town.” She looks confused at this for a moment before she realizes what I mean. “Oh, right. You arrived on the day of the Summer Sun Celebration when Nightmare Moon returned. So did you find what you were looking for?”
I wonder how to word this. “Well mostly, though I did have a few more questions come up about it as well. Especially since I doubt the book mentions everything about what happened during the events that you and your friends went through.” Luckily Twilight is happy to enlighten me on this, though she tries to downplay her importance in everything.
She does go on a few tangents throughout her story, but I decide to not interrupt her as it is all rather interesting. This is especially true as she goes into her explanation of the Elements of Harmony, which even includes some of her theories on what they are as well as what they had been used for. Like I was hoping there was no mention of the filly in any way, though I had one pony to check with just to be fully sure that they knew nothing about her.
I do manage to come up with a few more questions from her tale though. “So Princess Luna was Nightmare Moon, and she was extremely weakened after you used the Elements of Harmony, but what happened to all the power she had though? And what exactly was Nightmare Moon as from how you described it she was different from Luna but the same?”
Twilight takes a moment to consider these questions before answering. “I’m not really sure on what happened to her powers, they just seemed to vanish after we used the Elements. She was only about half the size as well than she was when she was Nightmare Moon and the armor she was wearing was scattered about. As for what exactly that was, I’m not really sure. She has all the memories of what she did as her though so I can only assume that it really was her but with something else as well.”
We both get quiet at this, though most likely for different reasons. There is really something strange about this situation in general, and I think the key lies with these Elements of Harmony. Unfortunately with how little information there is about them I really can’t figure out what. Figuring that there is nothing more to learn here with the little information I have, I decide to head out to my next destination.
Making my farewells to Twilight I leave the library in the direction of the Everfree. Along the way I spot a trio of familiar fillies and I wave to them as I pass. It doesn’t take me long to reach my destination where I proceed to knock on the door to Fluttershy’s abode. I hear a squeak of surprise from inside, so I know she is home, yet it takes a while before the door opens and I see the yellow pegasus peek through.
She opens the door wider when she notices who is out there. “Oh Flarenza, is something wrong? I didn’t expect anyone to show up today.” I smile at her as I bring out that package of things taken from my garden. “Well I thought that I’d visit you today as well as bring you a few more things from my garden.”
Fluttershy just ducks her head and tries to hide behind her mane at this. “Oh but you don’t need to bring me anything, I mean, if you don’t want to that is.” I just laugh as I levitate the stuff over to her and she invites me in. After the accident I had I had decided to visit her more often, even if we just sat in silence for long periods of time. I’m not sure how she really feels about it, but I like to think she actually enjoys the times I come over as she hasn’t been as shy as she normally would be when talking to me.
We spend a bit of time casually chatting over tea while I try to think of a way to ask her a question in a way to not give away why I’m asking. Soon our conversation ran down as we ran out of things to talk about. I knew I had to try and broach the subject somehow, I just wasn’t sure how best to do it. I guess starting at the beginning of it all would probably be best and look for a possible opening.
“I’ve been wondering about this since Twilight told me how you and your friends faced down Nightmare Moon. I’ve seen how you avoid fighting and always helped others when you could, but what did you think of Nightmare Moon when you saw her?” From the looks of it my question surprised her, enough that she almost looked like she was about to duck into hiding again, though something seemed to change her mind.
“Well I don’t really know exactly, I remember being terrified of her when she first appeared, yet there was something off about her. I don’t know what it was really, just a feeling really, but there seemed to be something sad about her eyes. There was the anger of course, yet when Twilight called out her name it looked like there was a flash of happiness in them as well.”
I lean forward slightly at her explanation. I’m not sure why but this does sound important to what I was trying to find out. “The second time I saw her, the look in her eyes was mostly the same, but that time I thought I saw something else behind it, something like a cry for help as if there were two ponies behind those eyes. I felt like I had to do something to help her, and that’s when the Elements went off.” I twitch a bit at her mention of two ponies as it seems to reinforce the feelings I had been having after talking with Twilight.
“When it was over and we found Luna once we had all recovered I could see a look of relief from her, as if being freed from a long nightmare, yet something seemed missing as well.” Fluttershy shakes her head after this before focusing on me again. “Oh, sorry for rambling on like that, I still feel strange when I think back to that day. Why were you asking about it though?”
I wonder at why that exact question came to mind myself, until I think back to that one moment in my past, back to those eyes that I will never be able to forget. “Once many years ago, I met a unicorn that did many horrible things.” I could barely hear my own voice as I tell this story, one that I never told before even in part like I am doing.
“Families, villages and anything else he touched he destroyed, nothing was safe from him. I still remember the look in his eyes the day I met him, there was nothing there. No remorse, no emotion to speak of at all, there was only emptiness.” I look up at Fluttershy as she cowers away at my description. She jumps a little in surprise when I look at her, and I can feel a wetness dripping down my face.
“I didn’t have any other way to stop him, yet even as he burned he still just stared at me with those empty eyes.” I completely break down at this point, not even trying to stop the tears. I can feel Fluttershy’s hooves around me as I just let everything go. I’m not sure how long we were both there, or even what she was saying to me through it all, but when I finally regain control of myself she began to talk.
“Sometimes there is nothing that you can do for some ponies out there, though I don’t like admitting it. When you’ve tried everything you can to help them and it’s still not enough then you sometimes have to make a hard choice. Nopony is perfect, even Princess Celestia had to banish her own sister for a thousand years before she could be helped, yet she regretted it every day. As long as you learn from your choices, and keep moving forward things will always get better.”
I look up at Fluttershy as she releases me to see her smiling sadly at me. I try to wipe my face before speaking again. “Sorry, I’ve just been haunted by that event so long that I had to tell somepony,” or at least a part of the story, “I’ve never actually told anypony about it before today.” I almost tell her about the filly as well, but hold off out of respect for her wishes.
“It’s alright Flarenza, sometimes a pony needs a shoulder to cry on and I’m happy to be there for a friend that needs one.” Those last words hit me harder than I would have expected. I had traveled so long that I never had time or even thought about making friends, yet here is somepony that doesn’t even know what I really am saying that I am one.
I smile at the pegasus, feeling much better than I was earlier as if a weight had been lifted from me. “Thank you; you have no idea how much better it makes me feel to hear you say that.” We just sit in silence from then on, just enjoying each other’s presence, before I decide to head back home. I felt that finding out if they knew about the filly in the castle was no longer important, as I knew that at least Fluttershy would definitely do anything in her power to help if she knew.
When I arrived home I put everything in its place before doing whatever last minute things needed doing before laying in my bed thinking about the last couple day’s events. “So one of the Princesses put that curse on the town, yet I wonder what it was supposed to accomplish. At least one innocent seems to be affected by it, possibly two if Ruby isn’t there voluntarily, yet with the power behind it I have no idea if I’d be able to fix anything. It’s not like I could go up to the rulers of the kingdom and ask about it.”
I sigh as even with this knowledge I’m not any closer to figuring the place out so instead I turn to the other problem. “That filly I may be able to help I think with enough time. If I’m correct then she really would technically be related to the princesses, though not in the way she thinks. The problem would be getting others to accept who she is and not what she possibly represents, and I think Fluttershy might be the only one who could help, though knowing Pinkie Pie she’d help as well but I’m not even going to bother trying to predict her actions.”
Seeing as the filly also seems to be scared of others I decide to take things slow and easy, not trying to push her into anything she isn’t ready for. Eventually I drift off to sleep, dreaming of what the future might bring though unlike usual I’m not alone.
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I guess Flossy will be helping with ploughing snow, because maybe.
.
Interesting turn for the story, nice cliff-hanger and whatnot
4315336 Well you are at least in the right general mythology there. I still haven't decided on the filly's name yet, though that one is tempting as it's the only name I've seen used so far.
4315372 Well I'm thinking something a bit different here as there seems to be something missing when you look at winter wrap-up as a whole. So as is often said in business, find a need and fill it. Though not like it gets implied in the Heartbreak stories
4315768
Hmmm...... A missing role.....
Then perhaps- no that wouldn't work....
I am thoroughly stumped......
I really have no idea, probably because I've only seen snow once though that's really no excuse.
Taking down the mistletoes perhaps?
And no idea what the Heartbreak series is either.
Argh this is frustrating. I give up!
SCIENCE