//------------------------------// // The Village // Story: A Rainbow Over Myst // by Moon Flame //------------------------------// Rainbow Dash watched the village from her cloud perch in the sky. Only the sound of the wind could be heard along with the occasional animal. She heard a clucking sound coming from a pound nearby, barely got a glimpse of it’s source before the fish swam below it’s depths. Below the ponds outcropping was a hut. It connected to the other huts via log constructed pathways. Might as well still have been part of the tree’s they were constructed from because this place were as inhabited as the thickest forrest. “Why are there no residents here?” Rainbow Dash asked Atrus. His answer came from the Myst book. “My wife, Catherine, she never really got over the loss of her home, even though her people were evacuated before Riven’s destruction. She remade some of our new Myst islands to look like her home. She convinced some of her people to move in again but...” Atrus hesitated. “But?” Rainbow Dash asked. “Well, lets say if someone made a copy out of you, no matter how god it may be, would it still be you?” Rainbow Dash laughed. “Well, i know for certain it wouldn’t be nearly as awesome.” “Neither did the residents. Writing something to look like something else could have ghastly consequences, literarily. It didn’t take long before the residents started seeing things, things that existed in Riven but only partly in this copy. I call it differences in writing styles, they called it ghosts.” “Ghosts? Now, that is ridiculous. There are no such thing as ghosts!” Rainbow Dash blasted suspiciously fast. “The village people seemed to think otherwise. They quickly deemed this place cursed and moved out. Now Catherine will have to settle for the sight of her birthplace mainly, rather than it’s life.” Atrus said, then teasing. ”But it’s ok if you’re scared.” “Me? Scared? Ha, no way!” Rainbow Dash blasted. “That’s good, because i’m positively certain that the next book page is down there. This is also the place we are probably going to find my linking book to my lab, after we put the five pages inside it that is. You should keep your eyes open.” Rainbow Dash made her way down to the wooden pathway. Only the lake slamming against the rocky bed could be heard along with the wind. The bright sun mixed with the wooden huts made everything look like a tourist resort creepily devoid of tourists. Above the cliffs Rainbow Dash spotted a strange guard tower formed like a cup with a pointy bottom. Wooden pathways riddled above, making way for the hovering series of neighborhoods. The wood of the huts had seemed white and fresh from afar but as Rainbow Dash got closer it became apparent that the wood was rotting. Loose building material hanged down from the ceilings inside the deterring households. Despite her confidence Rainbow Dash felt her heart creep up on her. She flung her eyeballs nervously around. One of the hanging building materials broke and fell toward the water. There were a big splash. “HUH!?” Rainbow Dash gasped and turned around rapidly. “Rainbow Dash? See, I knew you were scared.” Atrus teased from the strap around Rainbow Dash’s belly. “Me? Oh no it was... uuuh.... A fish!” Rainbow Dash lied. Atrus laughed. “Well, i guess he jumped out of the water then just to show you how surprised he was of seeing a pony here.” “Hehehehe, yea, i guess so.” Rainbow Dash laughed nervously, bizarrely feeling like she got good company by that none existing fish. Soon the dense village widened, making way for some kind of folk house. Round lamps made out of fabric hanged down from the tilting roof. Its walls made out of strong timber composed the steady gathering place, mighty compared to all the other huts that were mostly constructed by thin wood. ‘As good a place as any to start.’ Rainbow Dash thought. Upon entering the folk hut Rainbow Dash was surprised to se that it still had lights. “How does this place still have lights on?” Rainbow Dash asked. “The lights run on electricity. If i don’t misremember there is a dam nearby. The generators are probably still in function.” Rainbow Dash entered a gathering hall. On the wall she spotted a cascade of lamps hanging in straight lines. She bent her mouth in bewilderment as she realized that only some of them were lit. Rainbow Dash counted five lines. The first line had all six lamps glowing while the next only had three. The next line only had one and so on. “Atrus? Why are this room so oddly lit?” Rainbow Dash asked. She had the Myst book hanging open inside her strap so that Atrus could see. “I don’t know, maybe it’s a part of their tradition?” “You don’t know that? You know, for the creator of this world you don’t really know much about it.” Rainbow Dash teased. There was an irritating answer. “As i told you already, i merely describe the basic rules of the age. The culture is created by the inhabitants themselves.” Atrus lectured. Rainbow Dash laughed. “Ha, yea right. Blame your forgetfulness on your book characters.” Dash boomed. Atrus grumped. “Careful Rainbow Dash, or i might decide to make some pony adjustments on the first paragraphs. Despite, the people wasn’t written in, they were brought here by my...” Atrus hesitated. He sighed. “...My wife.” There was an obvious irritation in his voice. Rainbow Dash wasn’t the pony to delve into relationship dilemmas. “Hey, as long as i don't have to doge arrows i’m good!” Rainbow Dash looked around. She discovered a panel at the other end of the room. It had five buttons. She tried to press the first one. This resulted in four of the six lamps on the first row to go out and appear on the third row instead, leaving that row with only five lamps. It turned out that all five buttons removed a fixed amount of lamps from their corresponding row, adding the same amount to another row. Rainbow Dash’s eyebrows twisted in bewilderment. “Well this looks easy.” She remarked sarcastically. “Whats the solution here?” “Maybe those books have the answer?” Atrus asked. Rainbow Dash looked around and spotted a book shelf. “You mean that shelf?” “Yes, you better get started.” ‘You better get started.’ The phrase echoed inside Rainbow Dash’s simple mind. The jittery of all the books made her sight almost go blurry. “Huuuuuuuh” She moaned. Rainbow Dash walked up to the book shelf. She ran her hoof through the books. “I’ll be going away for a while. Try and look for clues regarding thirty lights divided up to five rows. It should have some relevance to the traditions of this village.” Atrus said. “You’re leaving me again?” Rainbow Dash asked with a tinge of desperation in her voice. “I need to go and look for clues about your world. You do want to get back to Equestria again, do you?” Rainbow Dash closed her eyes and sighed, nothing would give her more joy, and right now she only had one path to follow. She opened her eyes again and picked the first book that she had her hoof on. Once Atrus was gone Rainbow Dash sat down by the closest chair in the gathering hall. She opened the book and looked at the words. It was like looking into a sand pile, trying to single out the corns. Of course Rainbow Dash was not new to reading. Her favorite book of all time was Daring Do, an adventure book series about a treasure hunting pony named Daring Do. She had an entire Daring Do collection in Ponyville. But those books were all exiting and full of action. They had images and big clear letters. These books were all complicated, boring and on top of that the letters were all written by quill, curving in complicated ways that made them hard to make out. Rainbow Dash must have spent almost a minute trying to figure out that the first word in the book contained an S. An half hour passed, Rainbow Dash felt herself become more single minded the further she read. It was more about what the words said rather what they meant. Rainbow Dash felt her brain wrinkle, her eyebrows shrinking, her breath intensifying. She suddenly realized that she hadn’t understood a single paragraph the last three pages. Rainbow Dash raised her hooves and slammed them at the table. She violently shoveled the book sideways. The words were gone, but the emptiness remained. She took a second to calm herself. “Dad?” Rainbow Dash whispered. She expected to hear him answer. ‘Yes Dashie’? She expected to hear his hooves walk up behind her, once again. She expected that patching sunlight to send colored beams through his rainbow mane, once again. She expected him to pick up the book and point at the first phrase, once again. She expected him to ask her to read it from the top, once again. But dad wasn’t there. Rainbow Dash was astray from home and nopony else would come for her. This should be the ideal situation for Rainbow Dash, the brave and loyal adventurer, not afraid to defy the fiercest storm. But this was no ordinary storm of violent winds and slashing rain. No, this was a word storm of complicated letters and difficult to understand writing. If she failed this she would be stuck here forever, never seeing her friends again, only because she couldn’t remember a silly phrase. Rainbow Dash finally understood how Twilight Sparkle felt. But Twilight was well suited to face this storm. Rainbow Dash was nothing, worthless, a complete idiot. She stared blankly down at the table as her mind raced, feeling her stomach ache in a odd way. There were a male voice coming from the Myst book. “Rainbow Dash?” Atrus asked. “Hmmm.” Rainbow Dash mumbled weakly. “Is everything alright?” Rainbow Dash flung her eyeballs to the right, slightly catching a glance at the human male inside the Myst book. “Yea.” She sounded disinterested. Atrus looked with a hesitant face at the sulking pony inside the book. It was obvious that Rainbow Dash had trouble reading. A distant memory sailed past inside Atrus mind. He closed his eyes, trying to grasp one more look at his son Sirrus having the same problem, slightly before surrendering to reality again and accepting that the son he failed was dead. He felt something awakening, something he haven't felt for a long time. “Come on, let me se it.” Atrus said. Rainbow Dash raised her melancholic face from the table. She reached out her hoof and grabbed the ruffled up book. “Alright, i’ll read to you the first words and then you repeat. Ok?” “Mmmm.” Rainbow Dash mumbled weakly. “It was the third phase of the celebrations.” There were a moment of silence. Rainbow Dash opened her mouth and read weakly. “It was the third phase of the celebrations.” “The power source have been double checked for faults,” Atrus read. “The power source have been double checked for faults,” Rainbow Dash read. “to prevent an incident of breakdown like the last time.” “to prevent an incident of...” Rainbow Dash felt her mouth jam. “You see, thats b, r and e. Breakdown. Notice how the writer have drawn a line between B and e and then simply marked the small r with a curve?” Rainbow Dash heard what Atrus said, but she couldn’t hear the words that she just read. She snorted. Tears formed in her eyes. “There, there. You're doing great so far.” Atrus comforted. “Yea.” She mumbled with a broken voice. “Is it that you can't remember the words from the book?” Rainbow Dash hesitated. She managed to muster a small nod. “How long has it been that way for you?” Atrus asked. “Forever.” Rainbow Dash mannaged. “I’m an idiot.” “You’re not an idiot my little pony, you just have dyslexia, thats all.” “Dyslexia?” “You’re having trouble remembering words you read. It’s a common reading disorder that in no way makes you different from anyone else.” Atrus assured. Rainbow Dash snorted again. “I knew there were something wrong with me.” “Only if you were sick.” Atrus said. “But you just told me i was.” “Dyslexia is not a sickness, it’s a state of mind that means special hardships when it comes to reading. Dyslexia a reading disability, not a learning disability like some people wrongly believes. You solved that cage puzzle without me, you solved that water puzzle, you even solved that temple puzzle, that one was a doozie. You’re the smartest pony that i have ever known.” Rainbow Dash felt a smile form beneath her teary eyes. “But i’m the ONLY pony that you have ever known.” “See, you even deduced that.” Atrus said. His dark and comforting voice laid itself inside the pegasus pony’s aching chest. It felt lighter as she laughed again. “You’re not an idiot.” Atrus continued. “You’ll learn everything that I have learned and more, only in a different way. But let’s work with what we have first. Now, where were we?” Atrus helped Rainbow Dash to read the remaining chapter of the book, they even managed to throw in a bonus writing lesson. Rainbow Dash remembered when she wrote her entries into Twilights friendship journal. She remembered when she made big holes in it’s pages so that her friends wouldn’t see how clunky her letters were. Atrus learned Rainbow Dash how to sweep the coal stick into graceful lines. They eventually found the answer to the lamp puzzle. It corresponded to how many celebration stars there were in the night sky during the first, second, third, forth and fifth week of the sea celebrations. Atrus gave her a mini homework to write down one of the passages. “Not bad Rainbow Dash.” He complimented the result. “Thanks.” Rainbow Dash replied in a modest voice. A part of her wanted to roar out her awesomeness like she always did, but for some reason she felt more awesome being modest with Atrus, a guy whom she had started to grow respect for. Once it was time to enter the solution the puzzle itself wasn’t very difficult. But it would have been significantly more difficult without Atrus. As for Rainbow Dash, she felt smarter for every second she were in his presence. There were a clicking sound when all the rows was lit correctly. The wooden table inside the gathering hall opened and revealed a book page. The book page was lying on top of a book. When Rainbow Dash removed the page the title of the book revealed itself in capital letters: TOMAHNA “That is the age where me and Cathrine lives.” Atrus informed. “Cathrine.” Rainbow Dash mirrored. “Where is she now?” “She’s been visiting our daughter Yeesha. Our daughter is receiving education in an age called Serenia. But i suspect it won't be long before Cathrine is back. You’ll see her soon i recon. Now, try and put the pages inside the linking book.” Rainbow Dash browsed until she came to where the book was blank. She put the page she acquired from the temple into the book. There was a bright flash of light. Rainbow Dash had to cover her eyes. Once she looked again the page had been magically mended inside the book, it’s writing synced with the rest of the content. She did the same thing with the other two pages she had. Rainbow Dash blasted out her happiness. “Great! Now i only need to find the last two pages, find the Book Of Eternity and then...” Rainbow Dash saw something move in the corner of the hut. “Who’s there?” She asked aggressively. She was getting tired of seeing ponies without actually seeing them every time she finished a puzzle. “Listen! If you don’t answer me right now i promise you i will sonic rainboom you in the face!” There was only silence. Rainbow Dash walked up to where he saw the shadow. She noticed a wide open back door ahead. The brightness of the day engulfed the pegasus pony. Above her the wooden neighborhood towered. Wooden balconies had been fastened outside the skyward houses. She wailed her angry eyes around. “Show yourself!” She commanded again. She turned her head to the right. Her eyes festered on a man standing on one of the balconies. She raised her wings, ready to pounce. “I see you! Answer me right now or i’ll smack you!” The man didn’t move. Two more shapes appeared on the balcony. It was a human woman holding a baby. “Huh?” Rainbow Dash blurted, her mouth bending sideways in bewilderment. The man turned around. He looked at Rainbow Dash with bright white eyes. The woman with the child disappeared out of thin air. Rainbow Dash’s pupils diminished in horror. Her hooves started shaking. She wailed her eyes around rapidly as more and more shapes started to walk out on their respective balconies. Rainbow Dash wanted to fly away, but she felt her wings jam. A face appeared only centimeters in front of her eyes before blowing away with the wind. “WAAAA!” Rainbow Dash screamed. She turned around and galloped down the wooden pathway. All around her shapes were peaking their head from the gaping doorways of their huts. The fact that all this was happening right in the middle of bright daylight somehow made it even more creepy. Rainbow Dash felt her heart beat faster. She picked up the pace. She saw a small storage ahead. The door into the storage hut slammed open. Rainbow Dash was horrified to discover that there was no way out of the hut. She closed the door, grabbed a shovel and leaned it against the door, preventing it from opening from the outside. She galloped into a sub room and crawled in under a table. Her tail was crammed underneath her shaking blue body. Her hind legs packed together like a shrimp. Her hard eyes festered on the doorway. There were a long moment of silence. Rainbow Dash felt the shaking stop. It exploded again once she heard the sound of boots hitting the wooden floor. A man appeared just around the doorframe. He had his face riveted forward as he faced away from Rainbow Dash. He had a white vest and a pointy nose, his head half bold. “NO! You do not speak his name! He is NOT MY SON!” The man suddenly exploded. Slowly the old man turned his authoritarian face toward her. Rainbow Dash's heart thumped so fast she couldn’t hear her own thoughts, nor her reasoning. She raised her wings and rocketed toward the doorway, rammed the man and flew through the wooden wall behind him which broke into hundreds of flying wooden shrapnels. She proceeded out into the brightness of the day toward the clouds in the sky.