//------------------------------// // Penumbra // Story: Forever Twilight // by BlazzingInferno //------------------------------// “It’s morning.” Belvedere didn’t know exactly why he’d bothered saying it, what with his only having the supply closet furniture for company. The fridge and bed remained silent, unlike his heart. He stared down at his chest, at a loss for why it felt so painfully empty. The image in his mind was the only clue, the stone wall that he could imagine so clearly that it felt more like a forgotten memory resurfacing. Except it couldn’t be. He hadn’t worked with stone in years, and never during an emotional crisis of any sort. Perhaps he could finish sketching it out this morning, before anypony else came in. He’d set the final page into place and everything would just click: his crushing ache would vanish, he’d be back on the civic center project by noon, and he’d treat Cornice to a fancy dinner at closing time. His stomach loudly announced another sort of ache. When was the last time he’d eaten something? The fridge’s door flew open, and his magic extracted just what Cornice had promised: golden delicious apples, fresh-cut roses, wheatgrass granola, and a half-dozen other treats that he’d come to associate with marathon projects. An apple would do for now; he could always come back for more. He left the supply closet with breakfast floating behind him. He started toward his office, his hooves treading silently on the plush carpet, and paused as he came to Cornice’s crowded desk. Unfamiliar ponies stared at him from the picture frames, all of them smiling brightly. Cornice only appeared in one of them, a heart-shaped photo featuring her and, if he wasn’t mistaken, one of his mid-level architects. They were posing in front of a city skyline; she had her hooves wrapped around him, ready to cover his bespectacled face with kisses. “Good for you, Cornice… or should I say very very good for you, Mr… Eave, I think.” Passing her desk brought him face to face with an entirely different set of pictures. Businessponies and high-ranking officials lined his office’s outer wall. Each photo immortalized a feat of some kind, be it of the business or engineering variety. He appeared on the wall quite often, each time standing next to a client and a newly constructed or renovated building. The names of all but the most important clients escaped him. He walked up to the crown jewel of the collection, his photo with Princess Celestia, and watched his breath fog up the glass. She was smiling, of course, but not like the ponies in the photos on Cornice’s desk. “You don’t even remember my name. Why would you? I just patched up some old parts of your castle… no big deal.” Where were his photos of ponies genuinely smiling? There weren’t any here. There weren’t any at home either, save for the old family photo album. That was ancient history, though. Mom and Dad died when he was barely out of university, and there hadn’t been a mare in his life for longer still. “That’s what it took, though. It took focus, dedication, and drive to build… all of this.” The wall of business smiles staring back at him offered little comfort. “Well… Time to get to work.” With the slightest magical nudge, his office door swung open on its silent hinges. The papers covering the inner wall fluttered noisily as he marched by. How many times had he walked through that door with no thought other than whatever contract was currently keeping the lights on? When was the last time he’d been genuinely hungry for something new and willing to stop at nothing to see it built? That’s why Princess Celestia had hired him, after all: everypony else claimed the cracked stonework in the castle’s east wing was completely beyond repair and would have to be demolished. He’d said otherwise, and she’d listened. That’s how he built his empire: solving seemingly impossible problems, just because they were there. Engineering miracles paid well, thankfully. The apple rose to his mouth and he took a bite. That high-backed chair behind his desk was too comfortable; if he could fall asleep in it, then it wasn’t doing its job. Hadn’t he drawn up most of the Canterlot Castle renovation plans on a donut shop’s counter because his one-room office lacked a square inch of free table space? He turned around to head for the elevator. He’d borrow a chair from one of the empty cubicles downstairs. It wasn’t exactly a booth in a donut shop, but it was a start. Today would be a fruitful day, just as soon as he finished with his anguish-born obsession. He’d drown his lingering emotional turmoil in passion-filled problem solving, just like always. If he couldn’t find an architectural problem big enough, he’d just have to reach further out. Maybe he’d design playground equipment, or learn clockmaking. The apple dropped to the ground as soon as he glimpsed the wall. He’d left the office door open. He’d inadvertently created a hole in his unfinished drawing. “That’s what I’ve been missing!” Papers leapt off the door and found new places on either side of it. Belvedere paced back and forth, absentmindedly kicking his unfinished apple away as he stared at the wall with newfound focus. “It’s not supposed to be solid. There’s an opening… an archway… right here.” --- Belvedere awoke with a start, drawing in sharp breaths that for some reason smelled of damp soil. His forelegs prodded a cloth covering his face and nearly yanked it off before remembering where he’d fallen asleep. Amplified sunlight leaked in around the cloth’s edges, some of it tinged green by the tiny sprouts growing beside him. Twilight’s excitement from the previous night came roaring back, even if he hadn’t understood a word of her rapid-fire explanation aside from ‘magic’ and ‘sleep in the garden and you might feel better.’ Sleeping in blinding sunlight sounded crazy, but then again so did a pony with wings and a horn. Every other pony alive would’ve put masonry and indoor gardening on that list too. “Twilight?” Her soft, rhythmic breathing was the only response. At least she’d managed to fall asleep, despite the timbers howling even more than usual last night. He took a deep breath, got to his hooves, and waited. The headaches were always worst in the mornings, especially those following a day of magic use. He’d only done a little magic yesterday, thankfully. The pain wouldn’t be that bad, nothing like the excruciating episodes that followed constructing the garden. Ten of Twilight’s breaths went by. Then twenty. After thirty, his jaw started to smart from being clenched so tightly. By some miracle, his head was still clear. Slowly, he raised a hoof and prodded his horn, half expecting to find it missing. “Twilight? I-I think whatever you were talking about last night…  I… I feel amazing!” Belvedere trotted out of the garden and threw the cloth mask aside. “Twilight?” She was still nestled in his blankets at the foot of the stairs, sleeping soundly. Nothing about this moment seemed real, her least of all. Yesterday, when he’d found her in the crater, she’d been as alien a thing as a fallen star. Today that same star was wrapped in his blankets, sharing his home, and thinking an astounding number of his thoughts. Here was a pony every bit as excited about the simple acts of discovery, learning, and problem solving as he was, considering her experiments with magic and obsession she apparently had with books. He’d be obsessed with them too, if his world contained little repositories of information on any and every subject. What sort of things would he learn, if he could spend an hour in her world, or a day? What could she teach him, now that she was here? She’d already shown him the value of like-minded companionship. The years between his exile and her arrival felt so profoundly lonely in retrospect. Maybe Twilight would stay here with him. Maybe he’d never be lonely again. At last Twilight began to stir. Her eyes fluttered open, and her calm expression stretched into a grimace. “Ugh. I had the weirdest dr—oh no, it’s real… I’m really stuck here. I can’t be stuck here.” All his wonderful ideas turned to ash in his mouth. “I… good morning.” She pushed herself to a sitting position with one foreleg while she massaged her temple with the other. “Ooh, my head. Why won’t the spell wear off. Why can’t I go home.” His gaze dropped to the ground, and he pawed the earth with his hoof. “How bad is your headache?” “It’s nothing some tea wouldn’t help, but… I’ll survive. How are you feeling? How did sleeping in the sunlight go?” He glanced back at the hidden garden with a touch of his earlier enthusiasm. “Great! I feel like I could take on a timber.” Despite her drooping eyelids, she smiled. “That’s great! If my theory is correct—” a yawn interrupted her “—our entire concept of magical energy might be incomplete. I might actually be able to write a paper… or something… paper…” After a moment’s hesitation, Belvedere slipped his foreleg under hers and gently pulled her towards the garden. Maybe whatever helped him would do the same for her. “Great idea,” she murmured, “sunlight… sunlight’s everything, I think. Everypony thinks the sun’s one of the primary pony magic sources, but based on how you’re doing, it might be the magic source underlying everything else… the reason ponies can do anything… the reason we have the magic of friendship even.” “I’m sold, if it means I don’t have to wake up with killer headaches anymore. Why don’t you take a nap in there and see if it helps? I don’t know what tea is, but I’ll find us some breakfast, something fit for a princess.” She leaned against him for support. The warmth and softness of her coat made his legs weak. “I’m Twilight… just Twilight… Sparkle.” The garden curtain glowed teal with his magic, opening just enough for her to slip through. He remained on the outside, listening to her settle herself and resume her quiet, steady breathing. You’re a princess to me. Hours flew by without any of their usual monotony. Belvedere had gone through these motions so many times before, scraping moss off of rocks and digging up roots with his senses focused on the nearest sources of danger and his thoughts focused on the future. Someday I’ll be eating from the garden was what he’d usually tell himself on these lengthy excursions, along with how future generations would praise him for his foresight and ingenuity. ‘Someday’ still hadn’t come, but Twilight had. Today his senses felt razor-sharp, plucking out the sound of each pebble his hooves scattered and spotting each dust mote floating through the air. Today his heart was lightened with a much more concrete dream: Today I’ll spend time with Twilight. Everything prior to her arrival, every day of every year spent polishing gems, chiseling stones into blocks, and tending tiny seeds felt strangely distant. Only yesterday he’d been focused on the distant future, painstakingly gathering greenery from miles around to plant in the garden even as his stomach cried out in protest. “How long’s it been since I saw somepony smile?” He froze, instantly regretting speaking aloud. His eyes darted to the many patches of deep dark nearby: fifty paces to the left, twenty paces ahead, and a mere ten to the right. Seconds went by in silence, save for the thump of his heart. Maybe the timbers weren’t nearby. Maybe they were all asleep, considering how much howling and commotion he’d heard the previous night. With the greatest care, he started back the way he’d come, taking whole seconds with each step. The small lump of vegetation in his saddlebag could almost pass for a meal, assuming he wasn’t about to become a meal himself. His ears strained against the suddenly tense silence. If the timbers were ready to pounce, they were holding their breath just like he was. He never used to be so foolish as to speak near the deep dark. What was he thinking, letting the mere presence of another pony make him do stupid things? The village elders would’ve had plenty to say on the subject, starting with how it served him right for committing the cardinal sin of stacking one stone on top of another. He glared at the valley, eyes focused on the nearest pinpoint of light, the one he used to call home. His village’s bonfire had been burning for decades just like all the others, a bastion of heat, light, and safety for the ‘civilized’ ponies. And then another fire caught his eye, a tiny string of lights marching across the valley from its furthest reaches. A large group of ponies was on the move with torches, a near-unprecedented event for the normally insular mushroom eaters. What had them so agitated that they’d strike out into the unfamiliar dark with torches in hoof? He only needed to trace their heading across the valley to know the answer. At a steady trot they’d reach his doorstep in an hour. Nothing less than an all-out gallop would get him there first.