Moondancer Reads Dusty Old Books
Moondancer sat at an old wooden desk, cluttered with many quills, journals, inkwells, and bags of hay chips. The glow of the candle illuminated the small sector of the dark room. She must’ve been on her fifth book of the day by now. Her eyes glanced over the worn pages of the pottery textbook. If she didn’t end up as a magical nerd with her muzzle stuck in a bunch of old books, Moondancer swore to Celestia, she would probably be a pottery professor.
She became lost in a 2,001-page tome about centuries-old jars and mugs. The lengthy walls of text and grainy photographs of pots were a pleasure to the egghead’s eyes. She soaked in all of the wonderful information about the different styles of clay and methods of sculpting over the years. Within three hours, she finished the enormous book and set it aside to read the next one, an equally large book about Equestrian flowers and trees. Moondancer was giddy with excitement at the thought of learning about the Silver Arrowback flower, or the Manehattan Red Spruce. She opened the book to the first page.
“Wait… I’ve read this before… Four years ago…”
Moondancer skimmed through the familiar introduction. Her brow furrowed as disappointment washed over her. She tossed the book aside and angrily munched on a hoof-full of hay chips. “That would’ve been my last book for tonight. Now what!?”, she pondered to herself. She couldn’t just go to bed early; it was 1:00 AM for Luna’s sake!
Moondancer took a deep breath and tried to relax. “It’s okay, Moondancer. You can just go back to the library tomorrow and get some new books. Everything will be fine…”
“Everything is fine…”
~
“EVERYTHING IS NOT FINE!!”
Moondancer browsed through the towering shelves of the Canterlot Library. She tried her absolute hardest to find a single book that she hadn’t read, but hours of searching turned up nothing. She began to sweat and pant as she tried to find just one book.
“Pardon me, Miss Moondancer,” a voice from behind her chirped. “Are you quite alright?”
Moondancer looked behind her and saw one of the librarians staring at her with a concerned look.
“O-Oh…Everything is perfectly fine, heh. Just a bit stuffy in here, that’s all.” Moondancer gave a cheesy grin as she tried to compose herself.
The librarian looked confused. “Um… alright then. If you need anything, just give me a holler,” she said trotting away.
Moondancer giggled. “Heehee, sure thing!”
Moondancer went back to perusing the thousands of books. “Teatime for Eggheads? No, I read that. Tentmaking Through the Years? Ew, that one was awful! Terrific Teeter’s Terrifying Travels Through the Treetops!? Even worse!” The more she scanned the large novels and textbooks, the more stressed she became.
“How is this possible!? The Canterlot Library has every book in Equestria! I can’t just end up reading them all!”
After hours of searching, she came to the last section. The Z’s. This was her final chance at finding a book she had not read. “Zebraharan Mating Rituals? Zoology in Yakyakistan? I’ve read them all!?”
Finally, she came to the last book, simply titled Zzzzz. “Somepony desperately wanted their book to be last,” Moondancer thought to herself. It was a very interesting book though. She loved learning about the adorable sleep patterns of breezies.
“WAIT! I’ve read this book!” she thought in a panic. The realization hit her like a speeding train driven by Pinkie Pie after an intense baking session.
“I’ve read every book in Equestria…”
She could barely comprehend this. How could she read thousands of books so fast? Most ponies barely even pick up a book in their life, let alone read every single one! She left the library with a melancholic expression. The librarian was puzzled as she saw one of the most prolific readers in Equestria leave with not a single book in hoof. Moondancer’s entire life seemed to collapse in on itself. Her favorite thing to do, and she couldn’t do it anymore.
When the bookworm without any books arrived at her home, she flung herself on the couch and cried. Moondancer never thought that she’d hit a lower point in her life than when Twilight didn’t show up for the party, but this was far worse. She looked at all the books on the shelf and strewn on the floor. She thought of all the tomes and novels she read throughout the years, and now her journey was complete. There was only one thing left to do.
Complain to Twilight Sparkle about her problems.
~
“Moondancer, why are you complaining about your problems to me? I’m not a psychologist.”
“But Twiliiiiight! This is important!”
“Did you seriously travel here to Ponyville to whine about you reading too many dusty old books?”
Moondancer paused before answering. “Yes…”
“How could you just read every book in Equestria like that!? There’s currently 24709 books in existence. It would take multiple lifetimes to even read half that many!”
“I DON’T KNOW, TWILIGHT!!!”, she screamed at her, tears forming in her eyes. She took a deep breath. “Look… I’m sorry. It’s just that I’ve done everything there is to do, and I don’t know what to do next. I’ve lost the only thing that truly gave me joy in this life.”
“If reading a bunch of outdated biology textbooks is the only thing that brings you joy, you really need to get out more,” Twilight said with a blank expression.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Friendship is harmony, or however you say it. And I’ll have you know, I’ve talked with many ponies since that little… incident last year.”
“By ‘many ponies’ do you just mean Lemon Hearts and Minuette?”
Moondancer bit her lip.
“You haven’t made any friends, haven’t you?”
“ARE YOU GONNA HELP ME OR NOT!?” Moondancer shouted at her.
“Okay, okay! Um… are you sure you’ve read every book?”
“The Canterlot Library has every book ever made, and I’ve read them all.”
“Even the ones…” Twilight gulped. “In the adult section?”
“I’m lonely, okay!?”
Twilight snickered at the blushing nerd. Moondancer tugged at her sweater sleeves.
“Alright, alright. I understand. Now, just because you’ve read everything, it doesn’t mean that your days of learning are at an end. You can learn many things that aren’t written in books. Heck, you can write your own books!”
“Twilight, have you seen me write? I write worse than a teenager making a bunch of comedy stories based off a children’s cartoon!”
“Nonsense, Moondancer. You’ve written plenty of great stuff! Like… uh…”
Moondancer raised a curly eyebrow at the lavender alicorn.
“Okay, yes, you’re not that great of a writer. But… you can still learn many things! Why read ink on paper when you can experience things for themselves? Instead of looking at a picture of a plant, go and look at that plant in person. Instead of reading about spells, try performing that spell. You get what I’m saying?”
“Are you saying I should do something exciting with my life instead of stay holed up in my house like the antisocial mare that I am?”
“Well, yeah! Make something special out of your life! Have some fun for once!”
“Fun? That sounds great and all, but it could never fill my desire for the fresh smell of dried ink on parchment.”
“Can you shut up about books for one second!?”
“Well how would you like it if you knew everything!? How would you like it if reading your precious books was suddenly pointless!?”
“That’s because I have a life outside of learning! I have a pupil to tend to! I have magic to practice! I even have some dang friends that I actually interact with on a daily basis!”
Moondancer stared blankly at her. Tears began welling up in her eyes. “Twilight… you don’t understand. I used to have something to comfort me during my bad days. It’s gone now. And I can’t reclaim it.”
Twilight sighed. “I’m sorry, Moondancer. But you need to come to grips with this. I’ve told you this before. There’s more to life than being buried to your muzzle in books.”
“No, don’t be sorry. It’s me who’s at fault here. I’m just a dang nerd. A nerd with all the knowledge in Equestria and no way to express it.”
Twilight trotted over to her and looked deep into her eyes. “You’re one of the smartest ponies I know, Moondancer. Heck, you might be smarter than me in terms of book smarts. I mean, you understood quantum mechanics at age 7! It took me until age 9 to learn that!”
Moondancer giggled and wiped her tears. “Heh. Well, I’m not one to brag.”
“The point is, just because your journey of learning is at an end, it doesn’t mean that your life has become pointless. You can share your knowledge with your friends. I’m sure they would be astounded by your knowledge of timberwolf genetics!”
Moondancer smiled and hugged her friend close. “Thank you, Twilight. You’re such a wonderful pony.”
“Anytime. I am the princess of friendship after all,” Twilight said with a smile.
Moondancer held her friend closely as tears streamed down her face. The pain in her heart was slowly being filled with joy.
“Twilight! It’s a letter from the princess!”, said a purple dragon as he bursted into the room.
“What!? At this hour!? That never happens! Must be something urgent.” She grabbed the scroll in her telekinetic grasp and opened it up, reading it aloud.
Dear Princess Twilight,
Sorry for the interruption. It has come to my attention that Moondancer has read every book in Equestria. Because of this impressive achievement, it is with my great honor that I hereby dub her “Princess Moondancer, Princess of Books and Knowledge.” I’ll do the whole transporting-her-to-a-space-dimension-and-having-her-reflect-on-her-life-while-I-sing-an-annoying-song thing in a little bit. Just let me finish this delicious cake with Luna.
~Princess Celestia
Twilight hopped around the room with glee. “OMIGOSH OMIGOSH OMIGOSH YOU’RE A PRINCESS NOW!!”
Moondancer was puzzled. “Um, do I have to? Can’t I just be a regular nerd instead of a nerd with wings?”
“Oh don’t worry. Being a princess is fun! Everypony gets to respect you and you meet lots of famous ponies! Not only that, but you get expensive, non-accurate toys based off of you for the fillies to play with! They even sing lame songs and talk about brushing hair!”
Moondancer tugged at her sweater awkwardly. “Um, that’s great and all, but what would I have to do?”
“I imagine your job will only involve prereading books waiting to be published and making speeches about botany or whatever.”
“But… do I keep the sweater?”
“I can’t see why not.”
Moondancer smiled. “Look out world. Here comes Princess Egghead.”
Twilight stared blankly at the new princess.
“Don’t ever say that again”
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Heh. Moondancer's last line is what really makes this. I wasn't inclined to upvote until the end. Nice work.
8147277 - Well, there's a common headcanon that most ponies are illiterate. Maybe that has something to do with it? It is a pretty low number though.
I remember hearing someone do a reading about Twilight reading every book in Equestria and having a full mental breakdown. That was just as funny as this one.
8147377
This story actually made me look up how many different books the world has. There's about 130 million, with about 1 million different titles being published every year. (To clarify, "books" here means individual titles, not copies of the books; Harry Potter alone has 143 million copies in print.) This is just an estimate for how many books have been published in the modern age.
This could suggest multiple hypotheses about how comparatively few books there are in Equestria:
A) publishing is much more competitive, and far fewer ponies make it past the front door
B) there were more books at some point in time, but they were lost to a cataclysmic disaster (Library of Alexandria-style)
C) the Equestrian printing press is not yet advanced enough to produce the huge sums of books we have today
D) the Equestrian population is smaller than Earth's population, hence affecting the ratio of writers to regular ponies
At least, these are just a few reasons other than illiteracy for why there are so few books.
(Surprisingly, though, this isn't the fictional universe with the least amount of books. On Neopets, for instance, the pet who's read the most has about 3200 books. Very bright children like Twilight or Moondancer could probably do this by the time they go into junior high.)
8147644
Those are some neat ideas!
8147377
Yeah. Now that I think about it, I probably should have chosen a higher number. Oh well. :P
8147427
The Princess Moony cometh
Behold
B E H O L D
I can't believe I'm doing this but...
That second "haven't" should read "have".
Anyway, fun times around. Heh.
....or she could have gone to the publishing guild and ask for a notification when a new book was in print...
8147673 Mind if I do a reading of this? It's so funny
Welp shes going to need a virgin killer sweater....
...
..
FOR HER WINGS! OK!? FOR.HER.WINGS!!
Ridiculously cute, but Twi comes off as unsympathetic toward Moondancer (you'd think she'd be far less dismissive of book-reading than she is here), and the number of books in Equestria seems... uh...
Unrealistic, let's say.
8148035
OMIGOSH OMIGOSH OMIGOSH
Ahem, sorry. Go right ahead. Thanks so much. ^_^
8148038
A sweater with wittle wing holes~
8148046
I see what you mean, now that I think about it. I've always been hesitant to write main characters, as I'm afraid I'll make them do and say stuff that's out-of-character, which is why I usually do OCs or minor characers. :P
Thanks for the feedback though!
Babe, this is beautiful
love you
great
great story
love
24709 times say 200,000 words a book, [1] and if Moondancer reads 16 hours a day at a reading speed of 300 words per minute...
...well, that's only 47 years. And if we give her a moderately superhuman reading speed, should be quite doable.
But then as XKCD points out, most books aren't worth reading.
[1] Most novels are under 100,000 words
8148349 300 WPM is actually rather slow. I read on the higher end, clocking in at over 1000 WPM. Most people read slower, but seriously, have you seen Twilight read? She must read at 10,000 WPM. At that pace, it'd actually take only a year or two to read all those books.
24,709 books is not a lot.
8148590
Well, I was just using "high end of average":1,000 is definitely speed reading. But who knows how fast Ponies with an information-related special talent may read?
8148035 Just listened to it on YouTube, so cute.
8152553 thanks
Too bad they don't have a Books-A-Million in Equestria. Moondancer would never run out of something to read. She could sit in the store and read books while munching on overpriced coffee and cookies. (I'm being snarky. I do like BAM.)
As for Moondancer figures? Well, I saw a nifty little figure of her in, I believe, a Toy Fair convention. Hopefully, it'll be out soon.
The story was pretty funny, so it's faved.
8152768
Omg I remember Books A Million! I didn't even know they still existed!
And I want that Moony figure so badly~
Thanks for the fave! ^_^
8152795 No problem concerning the fave. I miss Borders. That was my other favorite book store.
8152833
Same here. I used to go there all the time. Was so sad when it closed.
8152868
I miss Borders a ton. Can't believe it's been six years already...
And I was so messed up by Hastings closing, I actually wrote a fic partially about it.
So you can become an alicorn by doing extraordinary things? That sounds awesome!
8254603
Thanks for the favorite! ^_^
As Princess, Moondancer will soon learn about the portal to the human world with its own books, and its internet...
oh jesus Christ.
YOU ARE GOING TO WRITE MORE CHAPTERS OR POSSIBLY A SEQUEL.
THIS IS NOT A REQUEST.
THIS IS NOT AN ORDER.
THIS IS A FACT.