Progress, and proof thereof · 12:05am Sep 21st, 2017
“That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.”
It applies to both timeless horrors and tagged stories.
That's Mr Stripes done and dusted, and I remain dubiously-honoured to have written his inaugural fic. He's a stallion with potential, and hopefully a couple more stories with him featuring will manifest. Assuming this unreasonably-prolonged piece of silliness doesn't put all other potential writers of him off for good, granted, but hopefully my malfeasance won't poison the well too much.
Speaking of long-dead eldritch things arising, Wedding March continues to make progress in the background. A gratifying amount of progress, with more of it being made in the last few days (spent out on a croft about as far west as the West Highlands'll permit) than in the whole of the last month. I've built up a fair head of steam, and I'll see if I can't ride it all the way to completion.
Before that far-off time, though, just to prove I've not spent my entire writing time staring slack-jawed at a screen and trying to eat my keyboard in a fit of confusion, have the opening scene-and-a-bit from Wedding March's in-progress (and as yet not proof-read) fifth chapter. It should set what some would charitably call a suitable tone for all other proceedings.
In a quiet alcove in a undisturbed corridor in Canterlot’s palace, as far away as possible from the day’s many epicentres of horribleness, Thorax tried and failed to stave off another round of panicked gibbering.
Most of the last few minutes had been a bit of a blur, punctuated on one end by a pecky, burny, evisceratey harbinger of the End-times that had scythed through the ranks like a self-guided firework wheel, and punctuated on the other by Thorax finally realising he was in a cool, quiet space that allowed for gibbering with a minimal risk of dismemberment.
The Great Unmasking hadn’t entirely gone to plan. And in that regard, at least, Thorax was a little relieved. He’d never liked the idea in the first place. He wasn’t a very good changeling, that had always been made plain to Thorax, and the sight of beings panicking, screaming, and futilely trying to protect each other and themselves from the swarm had distressed Thorax rather than enthusing him, like it did his swarm-mates. He’d found himself unable to contribute much more than flying along with the rest of the swarm and lighting up his horn and making half-hearted ‘pew!’ sounds whenever he thought he was being watched. He’d felt wretched for even that.
Apprehending and sealing away the apparent world leaders among the gathering hadn’t felt quite so bad. Once the swarm had attacked the city, keeping that particular gathering under lock and key and spell was just good sense, it’d keep other bad things from happening in the short-term. And anyone who called themselves a world leader had to be at least a little bit towards the evil end of the moral spectrum. There probably couldn’t be a single innocent amongst them, especially after the elephant leader had gone missing and the switcharound with Captain Syrphid had gone into play. Thorax could have lived with that.
Until they’d actually been sealed away, and the others had made him open that falcon’s cage, and living with things had suddenly become a vastly less likely possibility than it had been just a few minutes prior. Hence, blurriness and terror. The rest of the squadron had noticed after the falcon had finished with the first couple, and most of them had flown away or primly retreated into the gardens. Several had dithered a second too long out in the open, and the falcon fell upon them like natural selection’s last word.
Thorax had fled inside through an open window. He’d flown like mad through corridor after corridor, until something like peace had presented itself. He’d assumed the shape of one of the strapping golden-armoured guards in case any ponies stumbled on him. And then he’d slumped into a quiet alcove and had commenced making whatever unhappy noises his vocal apparatus had to offer.
Innocent beings were getting hurt. A mad falcon was on the loose. And here he was, unable to do a thing about either of those.
He wished Pharynx was here. Sure, he’d probably clout Thorax’s ear and make sardonic remarks, but at least he’d be here.
Thorax huddled to himself and did his best to keep his mewling as quiet as possible, when all of a sudden, he heard young-sounding voices to his left, down at the end of the corridor.
“Everything clear, y’all?”
“Yep!”
“Clear on this side!”
“My side’s still a blank wall.”
“Good. Ahead’s fine. Shahannahshan… uh, Sailears, if you’d oblige?”
“Toot!” And then there was the sound of rustling, some measured treads on the stone floor, and then something clunking back down again.
Thorax remained still in his alcove, holding his breath. He could look out to see who on earth they were, that group of voices. Alternatively, he could get torn wing-from-limb in a well-played ambush. Decisions, decisions.
While he waited, the voices came again, this time closer.
“Coast clear?”
“Yep!”
“Still clear!”
“Oh, hey, it’s a wall.”
“Clear here! Sailears?”
“Toot!” The enthusiastic trumpet rang out, and there was the same rustling, treading, and clunking as before. And despite himself, Thorax swallowed and leaned his head around to see what was going on. If this was a trap, then it was … odd. Odd enough to almost be a shame to the trappers not to fall into it.
He peeked down the left-hoof-side of the corridor, and the first thing he saw was a table trundling his way.
Not the usual sort of sidetable, though, if one needed evidence of that past the trundling. Big, grey, hoofless feet ambled at its base, twinkling past the folds of a long tablecloth. Smaller hooves appeared here and there at the sides, as well as one set of scaled feet. The whole thing, big enough for maybe two ponies sitting within spitting distance, trundled forwards for a moment longer under the steam of the grey feet. And then it stopped, falling an inch to the ground, and before Thorax entirely apprehended what was happening—
“Everypony?” The drawling voice came from near the front, just past the tablecloth.
“Clear as crystal!” The lip of the tablecloth rose on one side, to the left of the front, and Thorax glimpsed a small, white muzzle.
“Clear as … something else that’s clear!” This came from the back.
The tablecloth at the right-hoof side twitched up. A smaller, purpler, and distinctly higher-up muzzle was glimpsed. “Rhymes with ball.”
“And on my end—” The end of the tablecloth facing Thorax twitched up, revealing a yellow muzzle and a pair of big, bright eyes scanning the corridor ahead.
And Thorax remembered he was supposed to be in hiding, just at the same moment the filly sporting said muzzle and eyes declared, “Hey, there’s a guardspony in that alcove!
“Really?” “What the heck?” “What’re they doing there?” “Toot?” flew at Thorax like so many arrows as the sides of the table erupted open, and out from the flapping cloth came three pony fillies, a dragon whelp, and, last of all, an elephant calf who’d presumably been bearing the table an inch off the ground with his back. All of them were in various finery, all of them had Thorax dead within their sights, and all of them had questions.
“Hey! You’re a guardspony, right?” said one, a orange-hided pegasus who slipped round from the back and flapped clumsily ahead of the others. “What’s happening out there?”
“I, um,” said Thorax, all his planning instincts shutting down at the prospect of actually being discovered.
“Are our sisters alright?” said the next, a white-hided unicorn.
“That, er.”
“Ooh, I like your barding,” the elephant calf blithely volunteered. “My uncle’s said he’ll get me a traditional lamellar set for my next birthday, but that I shouldn’t expect anything more fitted until I’m fully-grown. Which doesn’t seem fair. I mean, if I’m the Shahanshah—“
“Gchk,” retorted Thorax, his brain short-circuiting at the sight of what had to be the elephant sovereign running loose from wherever he’d gotten himself to, before a yellow-hided earth pony filly leapt up for his attention, the one who’d been at the front.
“Are you inside to help Princess Celestia and Princess Cadance?” she said. “They’re in the throne room, and needing help something fierce.”
The desperate noise Thorax produced then was beyond the power of known letter combinations to convey, and was only halted when the little dragon in full evening wear seemed to muster his pluck, stride up alongside Thorax’s temporary muzzle, and give said muzzle a good flick. “Hey!” he said. “Hey, come on! Call yourself a guardspony?”
Thorax hadn’t been flicked on the muzzle like that since … since, well, at least the last time he’d seen Pharynx, who’d probably be fizzing with agitation after being left to guard the hive all by himself. He stared into the dragon whelp’s indignant eyes. “Gchk?” he managed, shambling some way back up the spectrum of sense.
“You heard! Come on! Canterlot’s being invaded! The princesses have been hurt or imprisoned, and other guardsponies are out there fighting! I recognised a lot of ‘em! Even if you’re new, why aren’t you with them?”
It dawned on Thorax just what pitfalls his current form may entail, which was never ideal when said pitfalls had already enclosed him up to his withers at the time of dawning. “I, I, I’m not, I mean, that is, oh, I, I ...”
“You scared? You don’t have to be.” The unicorn filly looked up in turn, her green eyes full of concern. “Come on, what’s your name?”
“My name?” Thorax, his mind a-jangle, forced his eyes to flicker across the room for any scrap of inspiration, any at all. “My name … is … er … Wall.” He paused, sinkingly aware that this hadn’t gone down entirely well, and tried to compensate with as much manic bluster he felt capable of mustering. “Yes, Sir Wall! Of the, um, Royal Guard! Dispensing vital guarding duties to this, er, corridor at this time of unexpected crisis, yes! And, and may I ask what you three think you’re doing, heaving that table around?”
“We’re not heaving it,” said the pegasus, her eyes lighting up. “We’re using it as part of a brilliant disguise tactic. Why just rush from cover to cover when you can take cover with you?”
“I helped as well!” said the elephant calf, sounding delighted about this. “It was no great trouble to help, either. Equestrians build their tables light.”
“It sure didn’t look like you were guarding,” the earth pony filly said with the air of one who declined to get too easily sidetracked. Her orange eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “It looked more like you were hiding in that there alcove and peeking out all fearful-like.”
“I...” Thorax jabbed his brain for one last spurt of guile, the friend of every changeling in a bind. “That … was part of my cunning ambush plan. To … to ambush miscreants. That needed ambushing.”
Curse his guile.
One flat assessment came from the dragon whelp, putting his ingenuity out its misery. “You’re not a guardspony at all, are you?”
Thorax’s mad, desperate eyes swivelled round to meet his cold, unconvinced green. Another wave of panic threatened to overwhelm him once again.
And then it threatened no longer, and simply did, all in one great burst. “Alright! Alright! I’m not a guardspony! I’m not anything! I’m terrible! All of this is terrible! There’s, there’s changelings attacking all the ponies outside and, and paralysing and terrifying and hunting down anypony they meet, and there’s nothing I can do! There’s this … horrible, fiery, murdery avatar of pure death flying around outside where the leaders have been imprisoned, and, and, and I don’t know what to do about that either! I don’t know about anything and I wish my brother was here and none of this was what I wanted to do and this corridor was all I could find and —”
Lung capacity finally stymied his gibbering, and Thorax subsided into hyperventilating. The ponies, elephant, and dragon hovered around him uncertainly for a moment or two, until Thorax became aware of one of them stepping forward. He almost shrieked when something patted his foreleg. “Hey,” came the voice of the little dragon. “Hey, look up.”
Thorax looked up, and met the whelp’s eyes, less cold than they’d been before. Behind him, the three pony fillies looked on, ready to chime in. And at the back, the elephant calf watched events with his head slightly tilted.
“Listen to me,” said the little dragon. “You are a guardspony, alright? You trained and drilled your legs off, you got the uniform, you took the oath, right? That means you’re the sort of pony who the princesses knew would stand up and be brave even when things looked hopeless.” The dragon grinned ruefully. “Well, can’t say for Luna, her homecoming being so recent and all, but I know Celestia and Cadance can figure out things about a pony even that pony might not know.”
“It don’t matter if you’re scared or you don’t feel like a guardspony,” said the earth pony filly, as Thorax boggled at this unexpected angle of attack. “All that matters is that you wade in anyway. That you act the hero part even if you don’t feel it’s yours to play. Make sense?”
“Even if what’s out there’s scaring you, you can still help us,” urged the unicorn. “We’re on a rescue mission! And you look like a born rescuer.”
“Yeah!” The pegasus grinned. “It sounds like you know where they are, anyhow!”
Why not a butler, or a maid? Why not just stay a changeling? Why?, Thorax bleated at his past self. Why a guardspony?
And why wasn’t he just flying away from this mad group’s line of enquiry? Why wasn’t he reflexively disliking the picture they seemed to have of him in their heads?
Because it was better than he was, he belatedly realised, just as the earth pony filly started talking again. “See, we’ve got a plan. Them world leaders you mentioned, that’ve been imprisoned? Sailears here reckons they could help us and maybe save all’ve Canterlot if they get let out. All you gotta do is lead us there, and we’d save everypony. Maybe. Somehow.”
The sudden, makeshift mental image of Sir Wall rose to the forefront and boomed something confident like, Ho ho, merely that, child? I shall rend the whole invading force atwain with my mighty thews, and receive medals and cakes and kisses from all the princesses shortly after. Do not fear! The much more tangible person of Thorax smothered Sir Wall in his sleep and trembled out, “Out there? Where the world leaders are kept? You think you could convince them?”
“Exactly there! And yep!”
Horrible, fiery, murdery avatars of pure death bobbed up helpfully in Thorax’s mind, and he whimpered to that effect. “But … but horrible, fiery, murdery avatars of pure death?”
“We can wrangle ‘em,” said the pegasus dismissively.
“And if we can’t, we’ve got you to help us out,” urged the unicorn filly with admiring eyes. “You’re a big, brave guardspony whose mettle’ll surely be proved, right?”
“Or your sinews stiffened, even.” This from the dragon.
“Or your pluck mustered?”
“Dander raised up, if we’re lucky.”
“Or your choler in ascendant,” offered the elephant, breaking his silence at last, his gaze somewhere distant.
That got him a round of curious looks. “Not heard that one before,” said the pegasus. “Is that a Pachydermian expression?”
“Maybe? I think it’s getting at the same thing as all of yours. Dame Lyuba’s all choler, if that fits.” He scratched an ear thoughtfully. “What’s a ‘mettle’ anyway? Is it like a —”
Thorax thought desperately while discussion ensued, and all the while in the background of his mind, Sir Wall jollied him on to live up to every one of these expressions and then some. If the gaggle of mostly-elderly and mostly grim-looking statesbeings (and one states-crown) could be of any use — and if they were leaders like the Queen, who could definitely rip apart anyone else in the hive, why shouldn’t they be? — then maybe this plan would be in with a shot. But there was still the small matter of the horrible, fiery, &c.
Mettle, sinews, pluck, dander, choler, and all. He had some of all of these in his frame, surely.
And if it could stop the rest of the swarm, stop this whole horrible Unmasking, stop innocents being hurt and terrified…
Mettle, sinews, pluck, dander, choler, check.
“If … if you,” Thorax ventured, getting their attention. “If you all stay close to me at all times, and you hide behind me, and hide in better places when I tell you, then maybe — just maybe — I’d be able to take you out there and let them out. And let you convince them. Maybe.”
He got no further before a chorus of small voices rose in cheer, praising Sir Wall. The dragon and the fillies all joined in, and the elephant looked on, as if delightedly surprised. And that chorus raised for Thorax (for Sir Wall, technically, but where did he come from but the better recesses of Thorax?) filled his heart with something like hope. Something like joy.
Maybe he could do something after all. Maybe his hive could be made to fly off, and no more innocents had to be terrorised this day. Maybe, just maybe, the world leaders would be good, moral, and trustworthy statesbeings, in whose capable hooves all this could be entrusted.
***
“So, is there any set order for cannibalism in times like these?” the Crown rasped archly. “I ask for curiosity's sake alone. You organics seem to need sustenance, see, and you’ll be relying on unorthodox sources ere the Arch-Minister’s plan ever bears fruit.”
“Shut whatever passes for your glittery and infinitely smug face, unless you have a better idea.”
“Go on, confide to me a step or two. From my own pragmatic assessment, I’d have assumed infirm and elderly first? Precious metals last, perchance?”
You are a treasure and a delight. Don't let anyone tell you differently.
I believe you.
In other news, I continue to be genuinely in awe at your skill in making the words of the English language trot out and dance for your amusement. Does one merely need to surrender their soul to the clutches of damnation to obtain the same skill or does Satan demand an additional price? Because I draw the line at firstborns.
On a more serious note, very glad to see more of Thorax. Also nice to see Pharynx getting a mention -- I loved the relationship he and Thorax had in "To Change a Changeling", they make wonderful brotherly pair.
Wait. Hold, as it were, the phone.
There's a difference?
Hello!
Good to hear from you.
...So. I finished the one about Mr. Stripes, and this sample is compelling reading. But the story in question is a sequel, a third installment following a ~27-page and a ~111-page story. I must first ask, are these required reading?
4674012
This, yes, yes.
4674012
Ach, feh. Flattery'll get you everywhere.
Nah, thank you. That was nice to read. The distinction between humourous self-depreciation and actual self-depreciation is prone to blurring.
4674019
Ach, more flattery. It'll get you everywhere, but there's only so many everywheres I can take folk, you appreciate.
And nothing so arcane's needed to get the English language on-side. All that's needed is regular terrorising and frequent whipping of the language from an impressionable age so it's properly broken to your will. Some deals with dark powers might be undertaken to instil the proper degree of terror, but that's optional, really.
This is a silver lining to inordinate lengths of time between chapters, of course. You get to include fun new bits of canon, like Pharynx and such.
4674193
Subtle differences, only subtle ones. It takes a trained eye to spot them, and of course, the same end result of frothing lunacy happens either way.
4674316
Hello, also! Aten't dead! Honest!
4674367
)
Hmm. I wouldn't say they're absolutely required - enough of the characters and the setting's necessary details should (hopefully) be in play in each story to let them act as standalones - though I would recommend reading them. (And ain't that a biased recommendation.
Have a wee whirl with the first one, if no others. It's much shorter and more condensed than the other two, and if it's to your taste, then the sequels might be as well.
4674381
...if this is an organised conspiracy to make me blush, it's working.
4674531
I admit to nothing. Sunhorses don't reveal their secrets and neither shall I!
Sir Wall is my favorite new character. Not Thorax, just Sir Wall. And the Crown wouldn't be making those suggestions of his if a dragon lord was locked in there!
Thorax's inner thoughts are genius. You can practically see him beginning to grow. I'd love to see Thorax as a reformed changeling meeting with the other leaders.
4674717
That's you cunningly anticipating Burro's own happy daydreams in the very next sentence after that excerpt.
4674734
He'd definitely be a fun addition to the gathering. Simoom, Greenhorn, and Sailears could always use another earnest type in their circle.
4674793 "You fillies have come to rescue us! And you've brought the Shashanah! And a Royal Guard! And a.....baby dragon.
Ok, Spike is it? The rest of us will sneak out and go for help, you stay here with the Crown and have a discussion on cannibalism."
Now that I think of it, there have been stories shipping Sombra and Luna, or Sombra and others, over the years, right? Because what's a better romantic story than an evil tyrant being redeemed by the love of a heroine who is similar to him?
We need to ship Capricious Crown X Element of Magic.
4674806
There's past form for this. No guarantees that it wouldn't just drag the Crown into even deeper chasms of vindictive wrath, granted, but it could be worth a shot.