//------------------------------//
// Pt.1 - Chapter 17 
// Story: The Starlight Broadcast 
// by ponyfhtagn 
//------------------------------//

Pa still wasn’t getting better.
And now Pinkie was getting worse.
“Maud, may I speak with you?” Cloudy Quartz said from the doorway.
Maud nodded. She tucked Pinkie’s blankets in and moved to get up.
Pinkie’s little hoof shot out and grabbed Maud’s foreleg.
“Don’t go,” Pinkie whispered.
“I’ll be right back,” Maud told her.
“No,” Pinkie said. “Don’t go back. Wrong way, wrong way.” Pinkie let go and clutched at her head. “Ahngnhhh. I messed it all up.”
“Shh. Everything is fine,” Maud said.
Pinkie rolled over and grumbled into her pillow.
Maud met with her mother, stepping outside the bedroom and shutting the door.
“Where are Limestone and Marble?” Maud asked straight away.
“They’re still working,” Cloudy Quartz said.
“But who’s watching them? One of us should be—”
“They are fine to work by themselves.”
“No they’re not—”
“Maud,” Cloudy Quartz’s tone cut through. “I know that sistering is your work and your cutiemark, but I have come to feel that you guard those fillies too closely. Limestone has confessed to me many a time that you do not give her enough space.”
“But Limestone’s hurting,” Maud said. “She’s not happy. I need to stay with her and find out what’s wrong.”
“What’s wrong is that she is of a very independent mind,” Cloudy Quartz said. “She always has been. I learned myself that I would need to let her be. Like fragile chalk, if held too tightly, she will crumble.”
Maud looked away. “…have I been making her unhappy?”
Cloudy Quartz shook her head. “Limestone misses Holder’s Boulder. It was a lodestone for her independence. A special task for her alone to take charge of. Now she is aimless. She lashes out.”
“…so it is my fault.”
“No,” Cloudy Quartz said, drawing Maud’s attention back. “There is no fault, save the fault line on which we built our home. And… I begin to wonder…”
“Yes?” Maud prompted.
Cloudy Quartz glanced down the hall. “Igneous does not worsen, but he does not recover. Without my assistance nor his, the productivity of our farm is diminished. Now Pinkamina has taken ill—”
“She’s not ill,” Maud interrupted.
Cloudy Quartz turned back to her. “Eldest. She is insensible. Regardless, she cannot have work and she cannot be trusted to her own. And it seems you will not leave her. I understand. But Limestone and Marble cannot attend to chores on their own.”
“You said Limestone wanted more responsibility.”
“Sometimes the things we want are not the things we need,” Cloudy Quartz said ominously. “Maud… Your Pa and I have been talking… I worry about him, and we worry both for little Pinkamina.”
“Where is this going?” Maud asked.
Cloudy Quartz nodded once. “We have made plans to leave the farm. We will pilgrimage back to the west, to our kinfolk. The Choosing Stone hath brought this family together. Now we must seek the wisdom of the Healing Stone. For Igneous… and for Pinkamina.”
Maud stood her ground by the bedroom door. “Pinkie isn’t sick. Not like Pa.”
“Pinkamina is not well, though.”
“Are we really going to do this? Take apart everything we’ve built here and just go back to roots and kin that I don’t even remember?”
“Maud, this farm cannot succeed if we carry on as we have been,” Cloudy Quartz said. “I must take care of my husband. I did try to make it your work. I even tried to bring in that outsider unicorn, but Pinkamina saw fit to chase her off.”
“Pinkie didn’t mean that,” Maud said. “Pinkie was just trying to help.”
“She has been screaming and wandering wild in the night time. Maud, see reason. I know you care for your sister and so do I. That is why we must bring her before the Healing Stone so that it may calm the visions that torment her and the mad things she says.”
“She is not mad,” Maud said, tapping her hoof. “She’s just different. Pinkie has always been different. I would love nothing more than to see her happy and well, but I will not pay it at the price of that which makes her special. The thing that makes her Pinkie.”
Cloudy Quartz tapped her own hoof. “Eldest you may be but you are still so young. These are our ways and your sister needs help. Regardless, the choice is already made. Igneous must see the Healing Stone, and there is nothing more we can do for this farm.”
Maud felt truly on the verge of raising her voice; and perhaps she would have if Marble hadn’t come scampering into the house.
“What is it, Marble?” Cloudy Quartz asked, coming down the stairs at the sound of the door banging.
“There’s a stranger outside…” Marble whispered.
“Where’s Limestone?” Maud asked.
Marble hid behind her mane in an all-too-telling way. “…talking.”
“Marble, stay here,” Cloudy Quartz said. “Keep an eye on your Pa and on Pinkamina if indeed you can. Maud, you may accompany me.”
“Yes Ma,” Maud said, following her mother to the front door.

“What are you supposed to be?” Limestone asked the stranger, tilting her head curiously.
“There’s nothing I’m ‘supposed’ to be,” Zecora said. “In this way each of us is free.”
“Yeah, but why are you all stripy?” Limestone asked.
“You question my birth-given pelt? This is a question with which I’ve dealt. So far the best reply I’ve got, is to in turn ask why you are not.” Zecora quirked a smile.
Limestone smiled back. “My sister’s kinda stripy. Not like you, though. She’s got these scratches on her legs and stuff from the blast a few weeks back. I think they’re gonna turn into scars. And her ear’s all messed up, too.” Limestone leant in to whisper. “Don’t tell her, but I think the ear looks pretty cool.”
“Limestone Marianne Pie!” her mother’s voice cut through.
Limestone flinched, then groaned. “I’m gonna get Marble for this…”
As Maud and Cloudy Quartz approached, Limestone didn’t even wait for orders.
“I’ll be inside then!” Limestone growled, trotting past and making for the house.
Maud hesitated and considered saying something supportive to her little sister. But what was there to say at a time like this?
“I am Cloudy Quartz,” Ma was saying to their visitor. “What brings you to our humble Rock Farm, traveller?”
“I have come here for Ponyville,” Zecora said. “I—”
“Ponyville, did I hear you say?” Cloudy Quartz broke in. “We had some folk from there not long ago.”
Zecora’s eye twitched slightly. “—have a task I must fulfil,” she finished. “I seek a stone that’s hard to find. Perhaps if you—”
“We have many stones here,” Cloudy Quartz cut in again. “What do you seek?”
Zecora’s eye twitched a little more severely. “—would be so kind,” she finished, with slight exasperation. “I seek the rock called cinder stone. I’m told that it calls these lands home.” She seemed relieved.
Cloudy Quartz studied her for a moment. “Home and stone do not rhyme.”
Zecora’s eye twitched again.
“Maud,” Cloudy Quartz said. “Please take… what was your name?”
“Zecora is—”
“Take Zecora and help her find some cinder stones. Take payment and meet me back at the house.”
“Yes, Ma,” Maud said.
With that done, Cloudy Quartz left them and returned inside.
Zecora was biting her lip and seemed on the verge of hyperventilating.
“You can say the rest now,” Maud assured her.
“Zecora-is-how-I-am-known and I think home rhymes fine with stone,” she exhaled.
“There, there,” Maud said.
Zecora took a few panting breaths. “Your mother’s tone and stony gaze, I fear have left me ratherrrr…”
“Phased?” Maud suggested.
Zecora shrugged and nodded. “Phased.”
“I’ll take you to the cinder stones now,” Maud said.
Zecora just nodded gratefully and followed along.
“I like your rhymes,” Maud said. “I like to write poems sometimes. About rocks. They’re all about rocks.”
“A subject I would also choose, if I had these lands as my muse.”
“Maybe not for much longer,” Maud confessed. “Ma wants to move us back to where we came from. She thinks we need to stay with ponies who live like us. And get healing from our old customs.”
“And this uprooting saddens you? You hesitate to follow through.”
“I can see why she thinks it’s a good idea,” Maud admitted. “Ma and Pa believe in things like the Healing Stone. But I don’t know that I do. I’ve studied many things about rocks, but I’ve never found them to heal ponies.”
“Sometimes the ways of other folk may seem to you to be a joke. But there’s more magic in creation than the common held foundations. By unicorns, or medicine, the power must come from within. How it may choose to manifest depends upon what you invest. A stone can be a healing force. But I prefer potions, of course.”
“Potions?” Maud said. “You mean like they sell in Canterlot?”
“Similar, but quite apart. My magic comes from my own heart. A wizard or a scientist may tell me that I should desist. They say my magic has no grounds. I say… let’s go a couple rounds.”
Maud gave one of her rare smiles. “Are you a wisemare?”
Zecora only smiled in return.
“So you think a stone can heal my Pa?” Maud asked.
“Maybe not or maybe so. In truth, small one, I do not know. But one thing I can say for true—it is not the stone that troubles you.”
Maud relented. “No. I suppose it’s the move. Ma and Pa may be attached to the west, but I grew up here. We kept many of our ways and customs but we also made allowances when we had reason to. I worry that our kinfolk will be too strict. That they won’t be understanding.”
“You speak as if you do suspect there’s something they will not accept.”
“I’m…” Maud hesitated. “I’m worried about my sisters. Some more than others.”
Zecora raised a hoof against the sun and squinted into the distance. She spied some faintly glowing dots under the shade of an overhanging rock formation.
“I think we’ve found the stones I seek,” she said. “I’ll gather them, and you may speak. Your sisters? One I met already. Tell me… what makes you feel unsteady?”
Zecora got down in the shade and scooped a few of the glowing pebbles into the pouch she had slung across her body.
Maud thought about answering or declining, and decided that she liked Zecora well enough and she could use some advice. “It’s mostly…” she began. Then she turned around and scanned the rocky fields. Maud sighed. “Pinkie,” she said sternly.
Eventually there was a giggle and a tuft of pink mane poked out from behind a large rock.
“Pinkie, come here,” Maud said.
The fluffy filly scurried up and hugged Maud’s leg. “Maud, Maud, Maud,” Pinkie said, but cheerfully. “The prophet will soon see the lies of the light. He learns the final piece from the broken lightning. Her light has dwindled but she is not destroyed—rise, rise and take new feather.” Then Pinkie began to pout. “The Neverwas Princess went too far last night. She will have fewer chances now.”
“Last night?” Maud asked. “Does this have something to do with why you were yelling ‘go back to the start’ over and over?”
“No,” Pinkie said. “Go back to the star, Maud. We already went back to the start.”
Zecora approached the sisters and showed Maud the bag of glowing stones. “This land holds striking minerals. I’m impressed with these materials.”
“Yeah,” Pinkie sneered at nopony in particular. “But Ma wants to go. Pa could get better but Pinkie won’t. I won’t like it west. It’s cold and old and grumpy. Grumpy, grumpy west, putting Pinkie to their tests…”
“Pinkie, you’ve never been west. How would you know what it’s like?” Maud asked.
“I don’t yet,” Pinkie said. “But after I do I will, and that’s how I know, because I peeked. Today I tried not to peek so much. I went too far before and it was all a big mess and none of it was there yet. I wanted to see, to know. Like the Neverwas Princess. She wanted to see all the layers of the dusty happened-times. Too much and she stopped being together. It hurts my head when I’m not together. So today I tried not to peek, but then I did. Let’s not go back, Maud. Let’s come back from going back.”
Maud looked at Zecora.
Zecora rubbed her chin and ‘hmm’d for a moment. “If I believe what I now spy, you must be little Pinkie Pie. I heard of you from one I know, but did not understand it though. I wonder at the way you speak and what it is at which you ‘peek’. You tell of things still yet to be, and what you say confuses me.”
Pinkie sat and pouted. “The bits get jumbled between seeing and saying. Ohh, I’m trying not to. I don’t know you but I know I could. Can I, Maud? Can I peek? It’s right there, just at the corner of seeing, at the edge of being, can I please? It buzzes at my eyes and my ears but I don’t peek because what if it hurts me? What if it makes Ma upset? She doesn’t like me how I am so I’m trying to be small and less.”
“Pinkie,” Maud said. “Don’t be less. Be you. And don’t say Ma doesn’t like you.”
“But she doesn’t,” Pinkie whispered. “She thinks I messed with things but I wanted to put them in better shapes, that’s all. Pieces had to move but I rushed it because it hurt and they had too many faces to be hanging around. Pinkie should be small and west. That makes Ma happy. Doesn’t make good patterns, though.”
“I’ll talk to Ma,” Maud said. “I don’t want to go either. We’ll work it out.”
Pinkie crept closer and grabbed Maud around the leg again, staring up at her with wide sparkling eyes. “Can I peek just a little bit?”
“If you’re careful,” Maud said eventually.
Pinkie’s head turned slowly and her eyes locked on Zecora, but her gaze seemed distant and unfocused.
Pinkie gasped. “It was you! You gave it. The thing. The prophet fell with distant things and crawled on his belly in the riddled place. Parasite. It does not fear you. It was not made for scaly things. Why does it differ? Ah. He is a mangled thing already, before he was become. Now it feeds on new fire and on what lurks unborn—”
Pinkie’s head snapped to the side suddenly.
“No!” she yelped. “Drifting too far. Not the point, not the point. Stranger, traveller, you, you, you. And who?” Pinkie stared at Zecora again. “All things change but you remain. Traveller you are not. You are the rock. You are the true Healing Stone,” Pinkie giggled. “Oh, and crafter. Crafting things. It does no good for scaly things. He walked too far and held on too long. But you…”
Pinkie let go of Maud and crept towards Zecora. The zebra did not flinch, though she did watch Pinkie closely.
“You have it fixed,” Pinkie whispered. “You have it shaped. The hurting misbehaves but it can be answered. You have method for this madness. The tree still twists but I see it blossom. This could be a betterment for Pinkie.” Pinkie latched onto Zecora’s leg and stared up at her. “Take me with you…” she whispered.
Zecora looked to Maud.
“I think she likes you,” Maud said.
“Buzz, buzz, buzz,” Pinkie muttered and twitched her notched ear. “Bzzzzzzzz—” she went on for a bit.
Zecora lifted the pouch of cinder stones. “What shall I pay to take these away?”
“That many? Ten bits,” Maud said.
Zecora rummaged in another pouch and brought out the necessary bits along with a small vial of deep blue liquid, all of which she pushed into Maud’s hooves.
“What’s this?” Maud asked.
“A gift, to help ease your concerns. Your father, if he takes a turn, would benefit from this to drink. Though he may not agree, I think. It’s best to leave him to his ways, but if you find in coming days you feel that worst has come to worst…” Zecora gave a one-shoulder shrug. “He may need something for his thirst.”
Maud looked cautiously back towards the house. “I don’t know…”
“Do nothing unless you are sure,” Zecora advised her. “I don’t condone dissent’s allure. But by the same, I can’t ignore a pony who should be cared for. Despite your family’s stringency, I’ll leave you this contingency. And if not used, that’s quite alright, if having it helps you sleep at night.”
Maud looked down at the little potion and nodded. “Okay. Pinkie, can you hide this?”
“—zzzzzz, huh?” Pinkie broke from her trance. “Oh. Okay.” She took the little potion and slipped it into her fluffy mane where it vanished without a trace.
“Such useful hair that you have there,” Zecora commented. “But now I beg… release my leg,” she winced.
“Oh.” Pinkie let go and shuffled back.
“Pinkamina?” Cloudy Quartz was calling from the house.
“We’d better go,” Maud said to Zecora.
“We could come back,” Pinkie said. “Or maybe we don’t. Or maybe nothing happens. What do you think?” Pinkie asked Zecora.
Zecora thought about everything she had just seen. “I think I see what troubles you. How this became, I can’t construe. There is no cure and no quick fix for what you see and what it inflicts. For there’s no potion on my shelf that can remove you from yourself. But if you wish to gain control… Perhaps I can help you reach that goal.”
“Pinkamina Diane Pie!?” Ma was calling sternly.
“Thankyou for the potion,” Maud said to Zecora. “And thankyou for listening. You’re from Ponyville? Maybe we’ll come visit you, if you think you can help.”
Zecora nodded. “I’ll see you there. Goodbye. Take care.”
Then Zecora left to catch her train while Maud scooped Pinkie up and carried her back home.
“She doesn’t listen,” Pinkie was muttering, draped over Maud’s back.
“Who?” Maud asked.
“Ma,” Pinkie said. “Go is go is go.”
“We’ll see,” Maud assured her.
“I wish you could see…” Pinkie mumbled.