End of year musings

Somewhere in Canterlot, a purple pegasus looked out his window. It had been well over a year since his friend and neighbor had disappeared after submitting several stories to Equestria Daily, and several months since his statue had left the Royal Canterlot Gardens.

He looked out over the city and watched as several ponies filtered about the south end's low income apartment blocks, several of them marching off to join the other unsung heroes of the city. Dishwashers, waiters, carriage pullers, maids and more filed their way out of the south end and into the heart of the city to do their duty, while others came back from their shifts to take some rest.

He turned away from his window and looked at the painting of his family that rested over the mantle of his fireplace, and frowned once again as he saw his father's smiling face with his brother standing up on father's back, wearing his guard helmet. "Where'd you run off to kid? Where did everything go so wrong?"

He shook his head as he looked past one of his many failed contraptions and left his apartment. As he crossed the hall, he heard several noises going on all around him as ponies gathered to celebrate the coming new year, and he wished he could join in the festivities. But not this year, at least, not yet. He looked at the apartment across the hall from him and pulled out a key to open the door. The tumblers worked as they should, and he soon was faced with the musty smell of the abandoned apartment.

The inside was sparsely decorated, unlike his own one bedroom apartment, this one was a studio, and it faced away from the heart of the city. He looked out of the windows and saw a train rolling down the track, headed to Ponyville.

Down below, he heard the calling of a barker pony. He looked down and saw a blue unicorn, and for a moment he jumped. He hoped that it was his friend, only to see that the mane was a silvery blue, and that it was a mare. She continued to call out her advertisement for a show loud enough for even him to hear it. "Come one, come all! See Sven Biller and his orchestra live! Followed by an act of daring feats never before whitnesed by equine eyes! See the Great And Powerful Trixie! One show only, here in Canterlot!

Steam Shine smiled for a moment as he continued to open all the windows in the apartment, letting in some much needed fresh air. He carefully walked around the card table holding the old Royal Unicorn typewriter. He never could understand why somepony would want one with a full keyboard when a binary one worked just as well, but his friend insisted that it was easier for him to use. He leaned in and saw that it was still in the state he saw it last, describing a story about Princess Luna's thousand years on the moon.

He danced around the table and a stack of clean paper, and saw a small block of gold. There was a small symbol of a stylized star, stamped under it were the words, "GPL, one strip."

He didn't even try to pretend to understand what it meant, or where it came from. Instead he continued throughout the room cleaning and prepping everything. Hoping that soon his friend would come home. Suddenly, the sound of a small crash caught his attention. Steam Shine looked out the window, and saw the Royal Courier had flown headlong into another pegasus, and letters were falling out of her satchel as it plummeted to the earth. "Oh muffins! MY LETTERS!"

There was a scattering of ponies as they assembled to help her quickly gather the mail, and she apologized as she took the letters and placed them back in her bag.

Steam Shine rolled his eyes and turned back to the apartment, there was no need to dust anything, and the room was still relatively clean since last week. The only thing he still had to do was change the calender. He flapped his wings and flew up to the calender and quickly took it down. "Maybe you'll come home tonight, after all, how long can a pony be missing?"

A universe away, in a different apartment, where different beings ruled the globe, a human male typed away at his computer. He was dressed all in black, and coughed into his hand a few times before blowing his nose. He'd been sick for a week now, and felt terrible. He knew that he had left the end of his year with projects not quite finished, but looked forward to a new year to finish them all in. "I'm sorry I left you alone Steam Shine, but you and your family will soon be reunited, and your friend will come home."

He lifted his head up and looked to his closed bedroom door. He frowned deeply at his messy room, and at how all his belongings, and his roommates and his roommates girlfriends stuff had all been shuffled to the point where he couldn't tell the two apart. On his floor several blankets lie on the ground as a makeshift bed for the pair of lovers, and his antique radio had been moved to the foot of his own bed, along with a pile of stuff. His couch was covered with his guests clothes, strewn about to make it useless to anyone, and his closet door was always forced open.

He sighed as he turned back around to face his computer screen and kept typing. "I guess I'm hearing things."

after several seconds he heard it again. "Scott! I need you!" He groaned deeply and took a long pull from his coffee mug before calling back, "I'm coming!" He quietly shut off his computer screen and went to help his disabled mother. "I'll finish the story later. It can wait."

Hello everyone, Phoenix Quill here. The end of 2013 is here, and 2014 is just around the corner. I wanted to show a unique perspective of my own little universe of Eqeustria, how stories done effect one of my characters, as well as stories not finished tend to put part of his life on hold.

2013 was a big year for me as far as stories go. Through Storm and Snow finally came to a close, as well as Only Shadows of the Past, The Great and Powerful Escape Artist. This year also saw the start of several new stories, including What are Little Ponies Made Of? And, Discord Writes A Ship Fic.

While these two stories still lie in wait for me to complete them, the stories Herbs, Roots, and Berries was written as a complete story in a short amount of time, as well as Somewhere Between Home, and Manehatten.

Unfortunately, some stories have proven to have growing pains of their own...

Captain Kirk, Equestrian has sat up on a shelf since January, edited, rewritten, and almost re-imagined several times in an effort to keep it moving, only to keep tripping as I would wind up walking away in frustration, still unsure on what should happen next, or if anything will happen at all.

The curse of now what had also plagued What Are Little Ponies Made Of, and I often wonder what to do with these stories. As some of you may know, those of you who are the closest to me, you will know that out of all my stories, What Are Little Ponies Made Of is what I feel to be my greatest bit of work, a diamond in the rough that needs some serious polishing.

However, as I sit here listening to the television in the other room spouting the words of idiots on a pedestal bestowed upon them by those that chose to produce reality television, I feel strangely at ease. Despite my illness, and time consuming job hunting. Despite my messy roommates and the eggshells they force me to walk upon, and despite my lack of updates for these stories, I feel something good is coming.

Have yourselves a happy new year, and I hope to see you guys more and more. Discord Writes will be updated soon, (maybe even by the end of this year?) and I'm going to dust off one of my stories to get it moving again.

See you all a little later.
Sincerely yours,

Scott Rodger Uribe,
AKA Phoenix Quill.