Two: The Ballad of Jackelope Valley
The train barreled along under a bright blue sky, the sun blazing gold at the peak of its climb. In the second-class sleeper car, two unicorns and a pegasus shared a compartment.
Raindrops blinked. "Um, curse? I thought--"
"That there's no such thing? There isn't," said Lyra. "It's just a story, and maybe a bit of old magic."
Vinyl Scratch grinned. "Real old magic."
Lyra sighed. "Look, if we're going to talk about this at midday, can we at least close the shades?"
Raindrops shrugged and pulled the shades closed, plunging the compartment into cool shadow.
Lyra concentrated, her horn glowing briefly. Displaced air bamfed quietly as her lyre disappeared from her bag and appeared floating between her front hooves.
"Ooh, nifty trick," said Vinyl Scratch.
Lyra strummed her instrument, thinking. "There's an old song about it," she said. "I memorized it for Traditional Ballads freshman year, and then made an illusion spellsong for it the next year. I haven't practiced it in years, but let's see how much I can remember..." The mint-colored unicorn began to sing along to the lyre's accompaniment, sweet but sad.
In days of old when Sun and Moon
Were sources of our hope
Before the Sun betrayed us all
There lived the jackelope
The lord of fire in the earth
And earth beneath the sea
Of water in the airs above
The beast in you and me
"I didn't know you played folk," said Vinyl Scratch. "Thought you were all hoity-toity about classical."
Lyra shrugged. "Folk is where classical came from. Besides, I love music, and I love old legends, why wouldn't I love the combination of the two?"
She played two themes at once, one slow and stately, the other quick and shy. They should not have harmonized as well as they did. "The jackelopes, according to legend, were half deer, half rabbit. The song tells that their buck was one of the oldest and wisest animals in the world, with great power over the magic of blended things--combinations that shouldn't work, but do. Like how water can float in the air as clouds, even though water's heavier than air."
Raindrops snorted. "No, every pegasus learns that in weather kindergarten! See, the water droplets--"
Lyra shook her head. "No, I meant, you know, symbolically."
Raindrops frowned. "This is a poetry thing, isn't it?" Lyra shrugged, and Raindrops sighed. "Okay, go on. Where's this curse come in?"
"I'm getting to that," said Lyra. "See, when the three tribes came together to found Equestria, the legend says they went to the jackelopes for advice. Mixing things that didn't belong together, you see?"
"It's like, what the jackelope's all about," said Vinyl Scratch, to Lyra's surprise. "Before, nobody ever thought of making a country with more than one kind of pony. But now, it's hard to think how any country could work without all three."
"Well... yes, exactly," Lyra continued. "Nobody knows what the jackelopes told them, but it worked, and in return they decreed that the most beautiful valley in Equestria would belong to the jackelopes forever."
"And that's Jackelope Valley?" asked Raindrops. "Where we're headed?"
Vinyl grinned. "Oh yeah. It's totes gorgeous. Big pretty lake, hella flowers. You can totally get your nature on."
Lyra sighed. "Well, that's what they say it used to be like." She began to play two new themes, one brash and bright, the other cool and soft. They passed in orderly cycle, taking turns stepping forward as the melody or back as the harmony.
Lyra's horn glowed, adding just a touch of magic to the music, and in her mind's eye Raindrops saw them, the white and gold alicorn of Day and the black and purple alicorn of Night. Beneath them spread the round, placid lake and peaceful meadows of Jackelope Valley. Day and night cycled, centuries passing, but the valley remained unchanged and untouched. "Oh," said Raindrops, guessing what was coming.
Slowly at first, and then faster and faster, the Sun theme slid out of sync, trying to drown out the Moon theme and take over the song. But the Moon held its ground, and finally the Sun theme lashed out in a violent clash, only for the paired jackelope themes to return.
Down came the Sun on that sweet vale
To ask the Buck a boon
"Tell me the truth, o creature: how
Can Sun absorb the Moon?
No answer gave the jackelope
The Sun pressed him in vain
Enraged at last she flew aloft
To bring down heaven's flame
The four themes twined together, and Raindrops saw Luna, her wings spreading wider and wider, great shadows of night that enfolded the entire valley--but fire stormed down from the sun and burned through her wings. The Moon theme faltered, and the jackelope themes sobbed softly as the Sun theme rampaged over them. The valley shriveled and burned, the lake boiling, the flowers and grasses consumed in the blaze. At last the torrent of flame ended, leaving a desolate waste, and the Sun theme faded away. All that remained of the music was a soft, mournful echo of the jackelope's themes, now broken apart and dying away.
Where once was meadow desert lies
No life, no rain, no hope
Yet we still sing who still recall
And mourn the jackelope
Raindrops settled back on her haunches as Lyra put down her lyre. "And we're going to this place... why, exactly?"
"Oh, the whole curse thing is just a legend," said Lyra. "No one's ever seen a jackelope, and there's no mention of them in any record until the first performance of the ballad three hundred years ago. The valley's probably named for some old Buffalo word, and then somepony thought it sounded like a cross between antelope and jackrabbit, so they made up a critter."
"I dunno," said Vinyl. "I've been there. There's something weird about that place. They say pegasi try to bring in clouds, so the festival would have water, y'know? But the clouds just dissolve as soon as they bring them in the valley, or this invisible wall thing stops them from coming in at all. And it seriously never rains. There's this little muddy patch at the bottom of the valley, and that's it. No water anywhere else in the place--and that patch gets smaller every time I go!"
Lyra shrugged. "It's right on the edge of the southern desert, it should be dry. Anyway, doesn't really matter whether the story's true, the point is it gives the festival its theme: Mixing things that don't go together. In this case, every kind of music there is, from traditional folk music," she lifted her lyre again, "to classical compositions, jazz, you name it. Even, apparently, crystalcore."
Raindrops grinned. "Like the DAUGHTERS of DISCORD!" she whooped. "This is going to be seriously epic!"
Vinyl Scratch grinned. "And with the low turnout, there might be a chance... nah, forget I said anything."
Lyra frowned and pondered that a moment. Before she could ask what Vinyl Scratch meant, however, Raindrops spoke up.
"I can see what you mean, though," the pegasus said. "Even if the curse is just a legend, with Corona back it's a little creepy to go somewhere she's supposed to have hated."
"Meh," said Vinyl Scratch. "Don't tell me you believe that old mare's tale!"
Raindrops sputtered. "You're the one who brought up the curse in the first place!"
"Sh'yeah, I don't mean the curse, R. That's real. I mean that whole evil-sun-princess-back-from-the-dead thing, obviously.'
Lyra could only stare, while Raindrops sputtered more. "But, we... you... We fought her! I know you saw it, you were there!"
Vinyl Scratch shrugged. "If I believed everything I saw, I'd be crazy," she said.
Lyra buried her face in her hooves as Raindrops tried to argue with Vinyl. This is going to be a long trip... she thought.
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Remaining quite an entertaining story. Perhaps, a bit short on this chapter as I would've liked to see it go a little longer, but overall flowed well. Wow that was truly one of the darkest things we've seen Corona really do whether in the past or present and it was nicely tied into her power set too so very nice on that. Thanks very much for sharing and I look forward to reading the next.
Edit: Oh my and I got first for this chapter. I'm supposed to say something obnoxious aren't I? Umm...YEAH SUMPONYITCHES I'S BEAT VAZAK BY 6 SECONDS YO! ...Yeah there we go.
All right new chapter!
I liked the discussion at the start and closing the shades and discussion of curses, all ways the little detail like that that make a fic.
The Jackelope song is certainly interesting, ooh and I loved Raindrops trying to chime in with science over poetry.
Vynle scratch professional
Overall a short but good chapter that I was happy to read!
Also, since I love you all, have a picture of Awesome Sauce, lead singer and bassist for the Daughters of Discord.
i1303.photobucket.com/albums/ag159/Jed_Blue/awesomesauce.png
1636336
Daughters of Discord, looks like a stallion
Love that cutie mark and the mohawk just works so well.
1636568
Nah, just a taller and buffer than usual mare. I guess it's a little unusual for mares in the show to have hooves like that, too, but I like them.
I'd make the other three members, but one's a crystal pony and I don't know of a pony maker that can do that, I can't find art for the cutie mark of one of the pegasi, and I haven't decided what the other pegasus looks like.
1637790
ah ok then!
I like them too and Zecora has them and there was probably a background pony who had them but I doubt I'd know them.
Just this one is perfectly fine,k ooh looking forward to the crystal pony, hmm ideas
Also sorry but wouldn't Raindrops be a little more weirded out by a place where it never rains? then again she's hardly defined by only that characteristic so don't worry, looking forward to the next chapter.
1637790 You could say the red is actually paint. To make it look like she bludgeoned an enemy to death with her hooves and they're now all bloody!!!
1637813
Raindrops is definitely weirded out by the place, but that's part of why she had to be the one to come with Lyra.
1638191
Hoof polish, I like it.
1638364
I'll be looking forward to seeing more of her reaction then.
Nice use of music here. I like when Lyra gets a chance to show off her musical prowess.
No such thing as curses, eh? I suppose when they say things like that, events such as those in Foalish Misadventures are inevitable. :-)
As to the poem:
It looks like you're going for an 8-6 syllable structure, with the pattern of 'unstressed-stressed-unstressed-stressed' syllables. It mostly works, but there's a few rough spots.
"Still both brought to us hope," is awkward. It's a Yoda-fication of the sentence, and it doesn't fit well with the rest of the verse. It feels forced.
"And beast in the pony" has the right number of syllables but not the right stressing. "Beast" and "Pone" are stressed, so it goes unstressed-stress-unstressed-unstressed-stressed-unstressed. The double unstressed syllable part makes the line feel shorter than usual, too short to fit the rhythm. It's also unclear what it actually means; is the jackelope lord of the 'ponyness' of ponies?
The Lyra/Raindrops discussion about rain is great. Also like the implication that Raindrops might have something of an intellectual bent, or at least paid attention in school. We haven't seen that side of her before.
This also seems a bit Yoda-fied. I think "Tell me the truth, o creature: how/Can Sun absorb the Moon?" Works better.
Nice. Very nice. I love this paragraph.
I get what this means, but the phrasing is awkward. If that's a deliberate choice, to emphasize the confusion in the wake of the jackalope's destruction, awesome. If not, consider: "Yet we still sing, we still recall/And mourn the jackelope."
A bit surprised that Vinyl believes that the valley is weird and Lyra doesn't; as Lyra's the bard who loves legends and tales, I'd think that would be flipped.
Lyra's mostly been shown playing classical music before. Which isn't to say that she can't do folk also, but Raindrops or Vinyl might be curious as to why she's doing folk instead of classical -- especially as her two big shows in Canterlot (in 'Helping Hands' and 'Through the Fire and Flame' were both classical, at least as far as I know).
Not really a big fan of using 'bucking' as an epithet. I don't think we've done that before, and while it's funny, it goes against the image of the Lunaverse as being an actual show from an alternate universe.
Intrigued by Vinyl being a skeptic. It strikes me that we don't know what, exactly, she was doing during Longest Night Longest Day. She wasn't in the episode, or in the side-stories Longest Night Everypony's Day (which so far feature Blueblood, Octavia, Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash, the Apples, and the Riches and Silvers). Hey, someone should totally write an LNEPD story about Vinyl; that fic's still open for submissions. :-)
1638897
Thanks for the comments!
Twilight says there's no such thing as curses in "Bridle Gossip," so I'm assuming that's common knowledge among magically trained unicorns. Of course, common knowledge often turns out to be wrong...
I'll fiddle with the song; I was going for traditional English ballad structure (alternating iambic tetrameter and iambic trimeter with rhymes on the trimeter lines) and I definitely did force it at times. I haven't written poetry since college, which is WAY longer ago than I like to think about, and it shows.
My thinking on Lyra's skepticism is that she's *trained* in legends and tales. She not only knows the stories, but the histories of the stories--which ones are based on historical events as opposed to made up to flatter an influential noble or entertain a crowd, and the fact that there's no evidence of the Ballad of Jackelope Valley being anywhere near as old as the events it describes, and the lack of any earlier descriptions, makes it very suspect in her eyes. Vinyl Scratch, on the other hand, has BEEN to the valley, so she *knows* it's weird.
I could have sworn I'd seen "bucking" used somewhere around here, but in hindsight it might have been on the forum rather than in a story.
Seriously considering taking a crack at that, because apparently I am a glutton for punishment. (I'm finding Vinyl Scratch the hardest of the three to write; Raindrops and Lyra just flow but VS I have to push.)
My thinking on VS has changed rapidly in the course of writing this chapter. Originally she was just going to be kind of insane in a harmless-but-annoying way, sort of like a toned-down Pinkie Pie. Her Epic Wub Time characterization, basically. Then I was going to make her more actively troll-ish. Originally her comments about Corona not existing were in the middle of the chapter, not the end, and involved Lyra being reluctant to say the name at midday, and VS more-or-less tricking her into doing it. I changed it because it seemed out-of-character for Lyra to be that afraid of Corona, but it had the side effect of making VS seem like less of a jerk, which in hindsight is probably a good thing.
Now I'm considering making VS a bit conspiracy-minded. She's got a bit of an anarchist flair, likes to buck the rules when she can get away with it, occasionally rants about the Mare (pony equivalent to the Man), that sort of thing.
1639026: I like the last characterization. It also fits well with what we came up with on the boards. (If you haven't seen the threads, there was a very popular idea that Vinyl is the daughter of Fancy and his first wife. Vinyl doesn't know that her dad is the head of the Shadowbolts/an elite spy/Batpony-equivalent, but does know that he's a high-up political fellow, and isn't all too keen on that. Hence her 'rebellion' by being a party DJ instead of following her father into politics. Fancy, of course, just wants Vinyl to be happy and so isn't phased by this rebellion at all... to Vinyl's irritation. :-D ).
1639223
Ooh, interesting. I went and tracked down the thread, and yes, that all works well together.
The one thing I think I'd like to add to her character is that she's a couple of years older than the L!6, and she and Octavia were roommates at college.
1639392: The age thing works, although I'd personally shy away from the roommates thing. It's a bit much for all the musicians to know each other, and so far we've been staying away from any of the usual Octy/Vinyl shipping/roommates/rivals/etc. There was a reference in an early draft of Musicians and Dreamers to Vinyl showing up at the Music Academy for an impromptu party, but that was redacted for similar reasons (Emeral raised the issues, and I wound up agreeing with him).
At least personally, I think it'd be best if the only interaction so far between the two was when Octy and Lyra did a jam session in Vinyl's studio in Ponyville.
1639429
Fair enough. It doesn't change anything I'm working on, so I'll leave it in personal headcanon and out of any stories.
Ya know this story is great but maybe you should hit the submission button so it gets public?
1644711
My fiancee wishes to give you a brohoof. We both agree, best euphemism ever.
I think I'm probably going to have to write an LDLN for Vinyl at this point, but it'll be REALLY HARD. She's definitely the hardest-to-write character in this story.
1640966
Is that how that works? I'm not really clear on the difference between published and submitted...
1647150: When a chapter is published, then people can see it if you give them a link to the chapter or the story. It won't show up on searches.
When you click 'submit', then the mods look at it. If they approve it, then people can see all your published chapters through searches or browsing the site. People who didn't see your link in the brainstorming thread will be able to find it.
1647150 Publish button lets other reads chapter, it also lets you update, but to make a story public (so it comes up on searches or on your profile page) you first need to get it submitted. On the story may page there should be a 'submit' button near the add chapter button. Press that and it'll go through the approval process. After it's gone through it and waited in the queue it'll be public and you'll be able to add it to the Lunaverse and the Raindrops Needs More Love group!
Updated the chapter based on the comments I got, and also Published the story.
Very nice so far. I'm intrigued by what you're setting up.
Also, the lead singer has the symbol of team Dai-Gurren as her cutie mark?
1655999
Thanks!
And yes, yes she does. I'm pretty sure if she ever meets Pokey Pierce it'll trigger Spiral Nemesis and destroy the universe.
1656762 Probably. What kind of talent would that represent anyway?
Being awesome?
Going beyond the impossible?
Pilotting giant robots?
1656795
Spiral energy!
So, all of the above.
1659867
It's really tempting, but... drug use. I don't think it really fits the canon. Also I don't think I could write it well.
That's why I think you should write the non-canon version where she's high as a kite.
1660566
Cool. I'm probably going to do mine tonight, but it might take me longer than one night.
I'm really enjoying this so far! The legend of the Jackelopes has just the right folk legend feel, while fitting in with well-known fact about how and when Corona did stuff. Gotta feel bad for the poor critters.
Ooh, poor jackalopes. :( I can see Corona doing that, too. A legend and a song... but they all come from somewhere, right?
So... guess who has two thumbs and just accidentally, irretrievably deleted everything he had written of Chapter Three so far?
1696467
If Burning Mane existed, it would be much more hardcore and countercultural than Jackelope Valley. Probably held outside Equestria proper, in one of the Hegemony states.
I really liked the bit at the end with Vinyl being the skeptic.
All in all, this story is shaping up to be good.
FlatEarthers in nutshell.