//------------------------------// // Surrealism // Story: Mancala // by Schismatism //------------------------------// I'll admit, quite readily, that me putting the four of them on the spot like that was both mean-spirited and short-sighted. It's one of those things that I've regretted for quite some time, and -- Ow! Okay, Sham, OKAY. I deserved that punch. Stupid ornery little -- OW! And that one too, but that's the last free punch you get! ...moving right along. Scarlet, being the sharpest of the bunch in every way, began by asking the one question I didn't want to answer. Specifically, "Where did you come from?" Clever little unicorn, cutting to the point of a dozen different questions that might have been asked, all in five words. She rarely spoke, but when she did... Well. I smiled, and I glanced out of those tiny teal-blue curtains covering the window, and I said, "Think of a tiny little ball, out there. Somewhere amidst all the stars, just circling one. And it did circle... no princesses to move the sun and moon, they did it all on their own. Think of that. Tiny little ball of mud and rock and water and air. Fire, too. Heh, fire, stone, water, air. Kind of an interesting parallel." I didn't recognize that my armband had lit up in four points. Not yet. Soon... "A tiny little mudball, spiraling its way around a star one point three million times its size. But large enough..." Here I turned to the quartet and smiled, without teeth, simply offering my eyes to them. So why did they take a step back? The world... may never know. "Large enough to contain seven billion people." As Doctor Horse entered the room after knocking and hearing a muffled, 'Enter at ye own peril', he couldn't help but look around at the sight that befell him. No fewer than three mares were supine perpendicular to a hospital bed, snoring profusely - including one of his own nurses! - and a fourth stallion was similarly konked out on a cushion on the floor, providing something of a counterpoint to the quartet! A fifth mare was found tapping at an odd tablet within her hooves, one which - despite all odds and sanity - was playing music, as she sat nearly supine in a chair, with all evidence of enjoyment. Her deep blue coat nearly appeared metallic, before the doctor recognized: a changeling? Here? "Oh! Hello," she chirped, as she set the tablet in her hooves to rest. "Sorry, I'm your patient. These four might warrant some consideration, though. I was holding a conversation with them, and they just, um." She waved her hooves in a manner which declared the whole room. "Slumped? I figured that I'd put them where they'd be comfortable." With a quiet sigh, the good doctor turned aside and massaged his horn, a surprisingly common tic these days. "So," began the puce stallion with the short black mane. "You're our latest mystery?" "Oh, I'm more than a mystery, I'm an riddle wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a sheet of nori," I couldn't help but reply, giving the stallion another two twitches of his ear and an eyebrow. Yes, I was keeping track. Yes, I was keeping count. You have to find your own fun when you're in a hospital. Besides, how exactly do you define this shiny little sheet of fiber which you can't tear off? By this point, I was at 150 points and about to earn a new achievement, and by the emotional waves he was giving off, the poor stallion wasn't so much sure if he should section me as he should section himself. On the other hand, he hadn't given me so much as a how-do-you-do before he sat himself down in front of me and began his psychoanalysis. Any pegasus worth her salt would have jumped out a window by now, but I was having too much fun, and what's the point of salt, anyway? Still... there's a point where you need to cut your losses. So, with a sigh, I slumped in my chair and explained, "Alright. Doc, I've been winding you up, and you know I have. Simple fact of the matter is... well. I woke up in the Everfree in the shiniest little glade I've ever seen in my life, cussed like I've never cussed before, and had three weirdos drop down on me and offer to escort me to the center of a very nice town..." "If I couldn't confirm a few of those facts," the doctor told me, looking at what must have been a clipboard of insanity, shaking his mane and scratching the back of his head. "And..." Here I laughed. "And if we weren't in the vicinity of the Everfree? The place Discord himself cursed?" Here the Doctor practically pulled his own mane out - AGAIN - and started shaking me. "You wake up in the Everfree with this strange artifact that nopony in their life has ever seen before, wrapped around your foreleg! The Princess herself is going to come down and want to see it--" Instantly, my heart went cold, as did the rest of my body. "Wait, Princess? You mean the... Princess of the Sun, right?" "Yes! She's going to want to come here and explain why not one but FOUR artifacts of the realm have suddenly been shattered!" Doctor Horse started to laugh like a madman, tugging at his hair and tail, while I looked down, very slowly, at what was wrapped around my arm - okay, foreleg. "Pause." The Doctor looked at me like I was about to explode, and then dove towards me like a ballistic missile, his hooves at my shoulders. "Pause? PAUSE? What do you think could POSSIBLY make me pause at--" "Four of these gems weren't shining before." Sometimes, there are... circumstances... where even the maddest of scientists will be given to pause. A blinking light, a shining signal, an occasional... beep. "And what exact-- Oh. What do you think it means?" "I'm not sure... but I have a sneaking suspicion it's Important." "Important?" Sometimes, though, you have to use Capital Letters to get your point across. "No. Important." "Oh Dear."