24 - Look What I Can Do
"And... pop!" She waved at Diamond Tiara dramatically as Comforting's spell covered Diamond's mane in soft flowers. There were no stems, just whole petals spreading out in a plentiful offering. "Ta dah!"
Silver clapped with joy at the display. "Nice. Why do some unicorns get all the good stuff?"
Diamond rolled her eyes. "Only some of them, though." She leveled a hoof at Comforting. "Most of them just use their horns as decorations."
Comforting knew little about that, on a societal level... "Earth ponies have talents too?" It came out as a question despite her intentions.
Diamond prodded at Comforting. "We have the 'talent' of knowing we don't have a talent. We're tougher and stronger, but does that matter? Seriously, think about it. What does being either of those thing do for me." She curled both hooves at herself. "You can't be extra fancy with that. You can't talk to ponies better that way. Closer to nature, some say, also useless!"
Both of the fillies were looking at her like she had all the answers. "You are two amazing earth ponies, and ponies period." Comforting sank to her haunches. "I couldn't be either of you, and even trying would make me look really stupid. You have talents and skills and you make them work." She offered a hoof towards Diamond. "I didn't mean to show off."
"Yes, you did." Diamond was smirking at that. "I know I would have if I could. I'm not mad that you're a unicorn. Good for you!"
Comforting put the puzzle bits together that Diamond was more annoyed at herself not being a 'special' pony. "Diamond, you're you, and you happen to be an amazing pony. I want to be your friend. Don't you?" She was looking at Silver.
Silver Spoon jumped as the focus shifted to her. "Oh! Yes! Duh. Like, she's my bestest friend." She threw a hoof over Diamond's back. "And that'll never change!" The two snugged close with a rebounding attitude. "It doesn't even matter. We know we're better."
"Yeah." Diamond stood up with a soft huff. "So, you learned your first spell. Good job. You going to rush out and learn another?"
"No!" Comforting inclined her head. "Memorizing one is a lot of work. But learning how is good. I'll probably only memorize a few and carry the rest with me." Visions of her walking about with an actual spellbook drove Comforting to a giggling fit. "Nothing wrong with that. I can learn the ones I use often enough it sticks."
Silver inclined her head with a new thought. "Well, since we're friends, we can ask you to do spells if we want, right?"
Diamond smirked with extra energy. "You just said the quiet part out loud. Oh, your party is on track. Hope you're ready to ring in that cutie mark." She waved grandly at Comforting's new mark. "Hey, how long do those flowers last? Is that a forever thing?" She glanced up at the flowers in her mane, still there for the time. "Or what?"
"A few minutes." Her horn glowed, not that either of the fillies could see it. "If I put in a lot more power, they could last longer, but that's tiring." Effort in equalled effort out, like most of life. "Thank you. I couldn't plan a party like that." Especially not in pony land, with the ponies. "The crusaders said they were staff and they'd get in?"
Diamond rolled her eyes. "Ha, yeah, technically... Which means they got invited with the rest of staff. You did say staff was invited."
"You make any foal friends?" Silver leaned in closer. "Besides us, I mean. Just need to be sure we invited everypony we're supposed to."
"You're my only foal friends." They were her peers, physical age wise. Which just made her mental age more awkward. "Is it a fun kind of party?"
Silver hiked a brow. "Most parties are. This one's deffos the fun kind. We'll be making it extra fun and making sure everypony there knows you're the star of the show."
"And they should be paying attention to you." Diamond touched rumps with Silver without a prompt. "That's what this is all about, so everyone knows what mark you got and what it means. Speaking of that." Silver sat up tall. "Get your speech ready. Ponies are going to expect you to give one saying what your mark means to you."
Oh no! That hadn't been explained to her before. "Oh... What did you two say?" Her eyes darted between their rumps and the marks emblazoned on them.
Silver turned to display her mark. "My mark, like, talks about my background, but not just, like, that. I was born with a silver spoon right in my mouth." She made a motion of stuffing silverware into her snout. "But it's up to, you know, me, what I do with it. I'm going to be the best pony I can be!"
Diamond waved that away. "Your mark is so indecisive! 'Be the best pony?' Pfft, anypony can and should be trying to do that. Now my mark!" She turned to display her tiara of a mark, then pointed up to her head where an identical tiara rested. "I knew what my destiny was way before I got this. I'm a bossy pony." She crossed her arms. "Now, sure, I had to learn what that meant and I'm still... learning how to be good at it, but I know exactly what I need to do."
Silver rolled her eyes slowly. "And you have friends who are ready to push you back onto better paths when you wander off."
"I do not wander off!" Diamond glared at her friend a moment, but it eased gently away. "I do have friends, though. One who's getting a party!" The two fillies clapped in mutual joy at Comforting's upcoming celebration. "So get to thinking about what that mark means to you. Seriously, you're not escaping without telling them all about it. That's--"
"Like, the point." Silver nodded quickly. "It's all about meeting the new and more mature, you. And we can't do that without knowing who the mature you is."
Comforting nodded at the two of them. "I'll get to thinking about that." She hadn't been planning on a speech, but that was expected, apparently... She wandered away with thoughtful hums and almost ran into another filly not far from her size. "Sorry! I was distracted."
"Golly." Cozy was smiling at her widely. "You look really really distracted." She clapped her hooves together as she reared up, wings carrying her up a few inches. "Can I help?"
Comforting sifted through her memories a moment. Right! She had run into Cozy before. That had not gone especially well... Still... "Hey again. Sorry about last time." She offered a hoof towards the smiling filly. "I was still learning my way around."
"It's no big deal." She met the offered hoof with her own, the two clopping firmly. "I was new once too! I had a freak out and everything." Cozy came back to the ground, both hooves at her cheeks. "I went to the crusaders for help. Have you met them?"
"I did!" Comforting grinned at the thought. "Just recently. I think I'll get to talk to them more soon. Are they nice?" She was pretty sure, but...
"To a fault, gosh!" Cozy waved a hoof wide. "Now, why is it you have good friends, like those two--" She inclined her head back at where Silver and Diamond had been left. "But you also have... questionable friends, like that, yuck, griffon. You know he's planning to take your stuff, right?"
Comforting gasped at the idea. "He wouldn't! If he wanted something I had, he'd just ask." And she'd probably give it up, if it wasn't important, but she didn't say that part out loud. "Have you even met them?"
"Met them long enough to know their group is trouble." Cozy tossed her curled mane. "They get into all kinds of trouble at school. Didn't you notice? Yona's always, gosh, talking about how proud she is of yak this, and yak that, instead of listening to the lessons."
Comforting opened her mouth just for no words to come out. Yeah, that sounded like Yona... "She is a lot smarter than she seems at first glance."
"What's the point if she's not paying attention?" Cozy clapped her hooves as she talked. "And don't even get started about that dragon. She's looking out for herself, and she knows how to be, gosh, violent. That's not the pony way."
"No..." Most ponies she had met were pretty not-violent. "But she's not a pony."
"Which is the problem, right?" Cozy grinned at her fellow equine. "I get you. We're both ponies, and see things the pony way." She patted Comforting on the shoulder. "So stop being a stranger, K?" She danced off without another word, as if completely confident she had gotten her point across.
Comforting was far less certain with a slow tilt. What was up with that pegasus? A bit confused and irritated, she turned to the bridge in the middle of town. It was a nice bridge, ornate and functional. It was just missing one thing she could fix. Comforting glared at the bridge as if it had done something wrong. "Pow!" Saying that was not required. With a glowing horn, she enacted the spell. One thing she was learning was that casting a spell didn't actually have a cap on how fast one went, other than increasing the odds one tripped over themselves and messed it up.
She was annoyed, so it came quickly. The bridge sprouted daisies and lilies, but they were kind of spiky and angry shades instead of natural colors. "Oh..." The flowers were a mirror into her own mental state, in a way. "Calm down..." She trotted up to the bridge and began brushing the angry flowers off of it. "It's not a big deal..." Making the flowers and seeing them was... kind of calming, really. Like holding up a mirror so she could straighten her mane.
"Nice." A unicorn was walking towards her with an easy smile. "Was that your first? I remember my first!" She laughed with a snort. "Wow, I had to shampoo for about a week."
That was Lyra. Comforting knew that pony from memory. "Hey." Wait, Lyra did know magic... "I meant to do flowers, just don't like these flowers." The flowers were already fading, deprived of a root and not given much magic to live on. "Twilight taught me."
"Twilight is the best." Lyra sat in front of the little filly. "Is she teaching you magic? Awesome! I was with her when we learned magic. Ohhhh, we were so cute and dumb." She leaned in at Comforting. "You got the cute part down. Are you just as dumb as we were? No shame! I'm still kinda dumb sometimes. Welcome to life!"
Comforting forgot all about trying ponies. Lyra was a good pony, and she could feel her mood lifting in the short chat. "Sometimes, I think. I've been dumb before!" She had a whole life to be dumb, often. "Nice to meet you, Lyra!" She offered a hoof.
Lyra met it, though an ear was off to the side. "Nice to meet you too, pony I don't know the name of!"
Crap. They hadn't exchanged names. "Dumb!"
"Toldja." Lyra burst into giggles. "Seriously, what's your name?"
"I'm Comforting Shade, or just Comforting, either way." She pointed the way. "I live with Fluttershy, my mom."
Lyra spit-take despite not drinking anything. "Woah! When did she get a special somepony, let alone..." She was eyeing Comforting in a whole new light.
"Not like that!" Comforting giggled at the confusion. "She adopted me. It was very nice of her."
"Now that sounds a bit more Fluttershy to me." Lyra's confusion faded away with a gentle smile. "Hey, kid, you like sweets?" She pointed the way. "My friend, Bon Bon, makes the best sweets. Tell her I said to give you a 'Welcome to Ponyville' bag!"
Stats
Page generated in 0.028 seconds
Total duration
955 users online
1,747,556 hits today, 2,454,720 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
Comforting is getting quite a bit of practice with that flower spell, and learning how her emotions affect the results.
Cozy Glow makes another appearance. And she is trying to be a troublemaker. I hope that Comforting doesn't give any weight to her bad-mouthing of other creatures.
11204808
That sounds like Cozy Glow, alright. I swear, the filly has a windigo in her family tree somewhere....
Well... quoting from
- MLP: FiM
- Slice of Life
Twilight Sparkle is an expert in unicorn magic, but earth pony magic remains a mystery to her. She's determined to uncover the earth tribe's secrets. What she learns will change her life . . . And it just might change Applejack's life as well.The figurative way, i guess.
Hopefully Comforting doesn't believe Cozy Glow
11204968
None of those apply beneficially to Silver Spoon or Diamond Tiara.
11204994
Have they tried?
I'm enjoying watching Diamond wander back and forth between Good Place and Bad Place.
Cozy Glow you lil shid don’t you make Comforting upset like that.
Speaking of will Cozy Glow be getting a redemption, a backstory, or anything like that? The show kinda just made her ‘evil for no reason’ and it always felt like a waste. I suppose she could have just been a born Sociopath deal as well but still.
I really like the title of the chapter, it feels like it has an appropriate childish innocence to it. :)
The opening conversation with Diamond and Silver was very comfy, somehow. I feel that a lot of that is because of Diamond. Like Starlight, she's a good pony but has made a lot of mistakes, and Silver and Comforting represent an old friend and a new friend helping her with her issues.
When Diamond mentioned Earth Pony powers not relating to or helping her with her talent, I had a mental image of Diamond eventually causing tiaras to accidentally sprout from the soil.
Cozy was appropriately ominous when she popped up out of nowhere with her signature "Golly."
It's really too bad her initial friendliness is an act, because Comforting and Cozy almost felt like they had a good thing going before Cozy ruined it with the casual racism.
Cozy's racism also feels like a case of "evil cannot comprehend good." Her words has less bite than they would, simply because Comforting has been spending enough time around the Young Six to actually get to know them.
Still, the unkind words were enough to put a damper on Comforting's mood. Hence her magic creating spiny plants at first. But I really thought it was a beautiful little touch to compare her calming her mood, and thus fixing the flowers, to straightening one's mane in the mirror.
When I read "a unicorn with an easy smile" I had a feeling it was going to be Lyra. But somehow I was very surprised for it to turn out to actually be Lyra.
I'm really impressed at how perfectly you got Lyra's voice! She's a character who sees a lot more love in the fandom than in canon, and yet she fits into this story, which has a very canon feel to it, like a glove!
Having her and Comforting hit it off so well, and relate to each other so fast, was the biggest surprise of this chapter, and my favorite part, too!
...maybe if Comforting sees BonBon soon, Comforting will find that she is not the only pony in Ponyville with some big past secrets.
A lot happened in this chapter! It's a good thing Comforting knows more friendly creatures than unfriendly ones, even if Cozy will continue to be a little filly who makes big problems.
Oh and before I forget, it will be very interesting to see how Comforting explains her interpretation of her Mark at her cute-ceañera.
11205102
The worst part of Cozy's words, in my view, is that she is not outright wrong with them. She brought up very real faults in the Young Six. More credit to them that they remain friends and grow anyway, because they are more than their starting points.
With magic drawing so much on what the user is thinking of, it being influenced by the user's mood just felt entirely appropriate. If you can create whatever flower you imagine, being a bad mood means you might end up with unhappy flowers. This could also be why very professional spellcasters tend to be able to stamp down their moods to a careful neutral space.
You can be happy after the spell's done.
11205123
That makes a whole lot of sense. It is a good thing that, as you pointed out, they are more than their starting points. :)
Yona comes to mind the most easily. Cozy is right that Yona does brag about her people a lot. But Yona also says a lot of other, more constructive things, too.
That's a great explanation of how emotions would relate to a spell, especially given the comment about "the flowers being your will made manifest" in the previous chapter.
In light of that it does make a lot of practical sense for a careful caster to remain emotional neutral...to the point of, as you noted, delaying happiness until after the spell is done.
...come to think of it, maybe that's why Chaos Magic seems so chaotic...Discord very often seems to be putting a lot of emotion into his spells.
Thank you for these little extra windows into the world of the story, by the way.
Yeah don't listen to Cozy Glow.
this cozy is too tame.... she acts like most of my coworkers when we are talking about other departments.
couldn't plan a party like that
11206933
Found another typo lurking nearby. Bonus!
11206939
I found a typo too.
11207119
Fixfix!
11204808
It's interesting to see Comfort spending time with both Cozy and Diamond Tiara. I'm curious to see how they will interact at the party.
11205123
It's an old manipulation tactic. Point out flaws, problems, etcetera with an individual or group, then throw in something tangentially related in the hopes that the truths give the tangent more weight. And Cozy does just love trying to manipulate those around her.
“Hey kid, I’ve got sweets in that white van right there.”
Yeah... Friend...