Gosling knew the power of communication. He was a pony from the Signal Corps, and was now in intelligence with the rank of Lantern Specialist. The need, the ability, the desire to communicate had been pounded into his head as part of his training. When communications broke down, conflicts established themselves or wars started. Silence was the ultimate undesirable outcome, and he thought about that now while he held Luna. When everything else had failed or fallen apart, he fell back on his training.
He had never had perfect faith to begin with and there was a lot of trouble remembering all of the dates for all of the holidays. Being shunned, he realised, there was a problem with the outreach of his faith, the connection to the community, but his belief held sound. It was just the way his mother had raised him. Fearful of the looming silence, Gosling thought of the terrifying train ride to Ponyville while transporting Celestia’s beloved sorcerer. He had prayed then, and something profound had happened. Through the power of faith alone, something had happened and they all had felt it.
How could that depart from him?
“Tell me,” he whispered, somehow finding some words to say, though he could not be sure if they were the right ones. “What is it like to die and be reborn?”
Blinking, Luna lifted her head and seemed startled. Though she shuddered, the hard sobbing ceased and her ears flapped around with endearing confusion. The Night Princess hiccupped and with the sudden sound she transformed, taking on the aspect of a bewildered foal. Having departed from her, no outward trace of maturity could be found, and somehow, she seemed much, much younger than she was.
“When you die and spontaneously reincarnate, how old are you? Does it hurt? Do you remember dying? Help me to understand you, Luna. Has facing death so many times damaged your mind in some fashion, do you think?”
“The pain can be very sudden but it is over very quick,” Luna blurted out while she stood in Gosling’s embrace, bewildered and confused. “I don’t know how old I am when I return… there is some variation with each renewal, but I am always at an age when I can talk, use magic, and care for myself, though small. I would guess a year or two beyond a yearling, give or take a few years.”
“I wonder what point there is to returning at such an age?” Gosling asked aloud.
“Celestia believes it aids in our development. We return at that stage of foal development when rapid learning takes place. This allows us to take in information rapidly, learn new languages, absorb new magic, all those things that foals miraculously seem to do when they hit the ‘why phase.’ I am inclined to agree with her. We have benefited from our many foalhoods.”
Musing on this, Gosling took away an unintended piece of information from this, something that confirmed his own beliefs: Celestia was the big thinker, Luna was the doer. If Luna was the thinker, she might have arrived at this conclusion on her own, but relied instead upon her sister’s ruminations. Sun and Moon, thinker and doer.
It also helped to explain how Luna had caught up on one-thousand years of missing history, because she had no doubt been schooled almost to death. It might explain why she had gone missing from the public for a time, for purely practical reasons. Luna was almost panting now, but no longer sobbing. He wasn’t sure what getting her to talk had accomplished, but it was better than silence.
“Gosling, I cannot bear the idea that I might have cost you your faith because of my vanity.” Ears pinning back, Luna leaned up against Gosling to the point where all of her weight rested against him, and then she went still. “Surely you must have something left to believe in?”
“Tell me about Bronze Blaze—”
“Why, Gosling?” Taken aback, Luna now looked panicked and she pleaded with him using her eyes.
“What was he to you? I want to know so that I might know what I am to you.”
“Gosling, the answers will be very damning—”
“Nevertheless, I want them. What damnation awaits me?”
Whimpering, Luna bit down upon her bottom lip with a savage chomp and then squirmed while fresh tears glistened in the corners of her eyes. “Bronze Blaze was sturdy and he was an enthusiastic breeder. While I held some degree of affection for him, we mostly had a physical relationship. He went about his business during the day and I ruled the night. Sometimes, I would pay him a visit as the sun was setting and catch him before he went to sleep. I was very selfish and I demanded so much of him. While I liked earth ponies for breeding, I prefered the company and conversation of the pegasus ponies, and that always bothered Bronze Blaze… that we had so little to talk about. I didn’t keep him around to talk to him, he was there to sire foals.”
“What of love?” Gosling asked.
Shaking her head, the raspy sounds of Luna’s breathing was all that could be heard for a time, and then with a timid voice she replied, “Things were different back then, Gosling. Love existed, but it was a luxury for the privileged few. Marriage, breeding, it was done for practical purposes. Celestia and I would tell ponies who they should breed with so that strong, viable bloodlines were created. They obeyed. It was a matter of survival. Bronze Blaze was of exceptional strength and a desirable type of intelligence, traits that were most advantageous, and Celestia bred him with dozens of mares, while using her magic to help them conceive. It was a duty like any other.”
“She made him sire foals with other mares?” Incredulous, Gosling’s scalp tightened while his ears stood straight. He thought of the tickets that had been sold that granted access to a dance with him.
“Sometimes, when funds or political favours were necessary, Celestia would bring our husband to a noble house and allow breeding rights. Gosling, please… you cannot judge the past by the standards of today. I am trying to be open with you, but this is very painful for me. I understand how this must sound.”
Overcome by his own curiousity, the very thing that had caused him to stumble into this whole mess, Gosling wanted answers and he knew that he had Luna right where he wanted her, because she was in no position to refuse him. Care and concern tempered his curiousity, but he still wanted answers—and would have them.
“What am I to you, Luna?”
“Gosling—”
Reaching out with his wing, he pressed his primaries against Luna’s lips, silencing her. “Answer carefully.”
Silence returned to the devastated library and Gosling, still holding Luna with one wing, pulled the primaries of the other away from her lips. Had he saved her from speaking too soon, or had he given her time to think of something convincing to say that might sway him? For now, all he could do was trust that her intentions were good.
“I’m here with you right now, trying to sort this out.” Blinking once, Luna turned her head away and stared down at the floor while her lower lip trembled. “I never meant to break our vows. I meant those. Gosling, I was looking forwards to having you as a husband… I just needed a little bit more time until I was ready. I was so busy thinking about myself… that I didn’t stop to think about you. It seemed like such a short time for me… and I had myself convinced that everything would work out. Gosling, please… please, you have to believe in my desire to do better and make this right somehow.”
To believe Luna now, in the aftermath of all this trouble while standing in the ruined library, such a thing would be a tremendous act of faith. Gosling stood with his wing still over Luna’s back and around her neck, and he struggled to determine if Luna was being sincere. Was she doing this for her sister’s happiness? For her own? For his happiness? There was no way to know, no way to tell, and if he believed her—if he chose to take her words at face value—it would most certainly be an act of faith.
“Gosling… your touch is almost unbearable right now… I am curiously and terrifyingly aroused—”
“Are you trying to seduce me now? Is that how you plan to keep me?” Gosling waited, holding back his emotions before he reacted, wondering what Luna was up to.
Luna responded with a nasal squeal, saying, “No! No! Gosling… I’m scared right now! Surely you can smell my muskiness and I keep having these thoughts, these thoughts about you having your way with me. If you did, I would not refuse you, because I want to keep you, and that scares me, because I wouldn’t tell you no. I’m having crazy thoughts right now! All of this is getting to me! You keep touching me and rubbing up against me and it is making me feel things! My fear of losing you is stronger than my fear of being taken advantage of!” When the last word was blurted out, Luna began crying again and this time, she hid her face behind one of her wings.
Crazy thoughts, Gosling thought to himself. This was his future, because Luna would continue to have crazy thoughts. She would progress from melancholy to mania, waxing and waning like the moon itself. Was he strong enough? He thought once more of faith, taking Luna’s word was a tremendous leap of faith, because she had crazy thoughts. When, for the first time, he worried that he might not have the mental fortitude required to fulfil his duties, he felt another tearing sensation in his heart—something that had happened so many times already that he had lost count.
Gosling had testicular fortitude—a fact that he took immense pride in—but he had some serious doubts manifesting about his future. He had participated in combat a number of times, he had gleefully and recklessly thrown himself into the chaotic fracas that was the harpy invasion of Ponyville. Disobeying orders, he had lead the charge—and the guards that had followed him had suffered immense casualties. Gosling fought on the front lines though, and had refused to hide behind his own troops.
What he faced now scared him far more than charging into a flock of harpies.
“I take back what I said, Gosling… about not having faith.” Luna’s voice cracked halfway through her sentence and she peered out from behind her wing, cautious. “I was wrong. I do have faith, I just couldn’t see it until just a moment ago. I have faith in your commitment to duty.”
Using his own wing, Gosling pushed Luna’s wing away from her face. “I don’t follow.”
“You saved me from the darkness elemental. You somehow pushed your way through a living nightmare and you talked a darkness elemental to death. Even now, I don’t understand how you did it, but it gives me something to believe in.” Luna shivered and when her mood shifted once more, she pressed up against Gosling once more.
He considered these words, but had no idea how to feel about them and Gosling felt his thoughts dividing, distracting him. Was Luna having crazy thoughts again, or did she really mean this? Did he dare ask? What consequences might his questions have? Would his callous queries or insensitive inquiries rip apart whatever fragile bloom that was Luna’s newfound faith? Having felt his own faith shatter, he couldn’t risk doing that to another.
Why?
What belief did he possess?
Perhaps he was wrong. What drove him to be a better pony? Something had inspired him. What motivated him for greatness? How had he rescued Luna? Could he save her now? Surely something had given him the strength to go on in that dark house of horror. What gave a pony greatness? The answer had always been faith—but now?
Gosling arrived in an odd place, a sort of limbo that existed beyond his understanding, and he found it terrifying. His mother had warned him about questioning faith, because faith was like a knitted sweater; if one picked at it too much, it would unravel and be a sweater no more. All the hard work to make it what it was, a sweater, would be gone, and you’d be left with string. And what good was string?
“Does having this faith in my sense of duty make you feel better?” Gosling asked while he floundered, hoping against hope that he could find his own way out of his own mire of doubt. It almost felt like he had flown for some great distance, that he had flown past the point of reasonable exhaustion, and now, he approached some unknown destination that he was ill-prepared for.
For her part, Luna seemed quite surprised by the question; yes, she was thrown off guard and Gosling could see it by how she reacted. She withdrew, blinking, her ears rising and falling, and her lips pressed into a tight pucker of concentration—that, even in his current state of mind he could not help but think about kissing. What did that say about him, he wondered?
Moving about in some great animated way, Luna shuffled on her hooves, wiped her nose with her wing, and her almost-luminous eyes became unfocused while lost in her continuous cogitation. Gosling found her beautiful, even now, even with her acne, with her chapped lips, her face left soggy, sodden, and stained by tears, and her bloodshot eyes. Luna, lost in thought, failed to notice when Gosling closed the distance between them and pressed his lips against the corner of her mouth.
At his touch, Luna shrieked and then had something of a screamy-filly moment while Gosling pulled back, apologetic. He had no idea what had come over him and he thought about Luna’s terrifying, crazy thoughts about him taking her right here on the spot. Luna’s voice was like some great force channeled through an organ pipe, more musical note than terrified utterance.
Yanking his head away, Gosling did everything he could to look harmless.
Something almost like anger flashed in Luna’s eyes and she hissed out the words, “Terrified arousal is the worst!”
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me.” Unsure of what good his words were, Gosling saw that Luna was jittery now and her hind legs shuffled from side to side while also squeezing together. Relaxing his hold on her with his wing, but only just a little, he waited for an answer to his question.
Eyes narrowing to a half-open state, Luna’s emotions ran their course, going from terrified, angry-whatever to something that appeared to be reluctant acceptance, followed by a softening of her features. “My faith in your sense of duty is the only way I have of knowing that your intentions are good right now. But for a second there, I had crazy thoughts, Gosling… crazy thoughts!”
Luna had crazy thoughts, but Gosling had crazy questions. Why was he a good pony? Right now, he could most certainly take advantage of Luna and she would let him. He could dominate her, he could have the satisfaction of conquest, and like she had said, she would not refuse him, she couldn’t refuse him because she wanted him to stay. Right now, he could establish himself as the dominant partner in this relationship—he could exploit her weakness and vulnerability.
So why didn’t he?
Where did morality come from, if not faith?
The empty ache inside offered no answers and Gosling was left wondering, what made him good? Why didn’t he just dominate Luna? She would cry, she would blubber, she would sob and shriek beneath him while he had his way with her, and no doubt, it would be satisfying. For the rest of his life, he would be able to lord himself over Luna, having established that he was the stronger of the two, and she would do nothing for fear of her sister’s loss. In public, he would be the devoted, loving husband, but in the bedroom, he would be a brutal, dominating tyrant.
But Luna would not be happy—and happiness meant something to Gosling. What it meant was unknown, but Luna’s happiness was more important than his own, which meant that his fantasies for revenge and power meant nothing—were nothing—because without happiness, there was no point. Without happiness, there was no point to anything… not even faith.
He could be just awful and Luna would bear this, knowing it would pass, knowing it was temporary, and that one day, he would be no more. She would do it for her sister’s sake, she would hide it for her sister’s sake, and no doubt, Luna’s self-flagellating nature would secretly relish such torment behind closed doors. There might even be a sort of happiness—but not a good happiness.
“Gosling… dearest, there is something up with your mark—”
Scarcely hearing Luna’s words, Gosling was lost in thought. He was lost in questions of what was good, what was moral, and what was faith. Luna had faith in his sense of duty, and that sense of duty and the faith she had in it, it held back the worst parts of himself that Gosling held within, the parts of himself that he refused to even acknowledge that they existed…
But surely Luna knew of them.
Luna had to know.
Surely, Luna had seen.
Without a doubt, Luna had seen the awful dreams he had about Skyfire Flash, and all of the dreadful ways he longed to punish her. All of the ways he wanted to hurt her, to dominate her, to break her will. To strip away all of her free will and sense of free agency for what she had done to him. Gosling lived with such awful things hidden away inside of him, and it was his faith that kept him turned away from his darker nature.
And Luna had to know. Right now, at this very moment, Luna had to know, and here she was, alone with him, facing him after having lied to him, she had to know what dreadful monsters lurked within his psyche, what real danger she faced by remaining with him, alone, with no sister to guard her in this now-ruined library.
“—it’s glowing.”
“What?” Snapped from his reverie, a bewildered Gosling tried to make sense of things while shame and uncertainty clouded his mind.
“Gosling, your ducks… they have a curious glow about them.”
Whipping his head around, Gosling saw the light emanating from his hindquarters, but had no words. His rubber ducks—both of them—were illuminated with a brilliant, golden-yellow light. What did it mean? Why was this happening? Why was this happening now? What purpose did this serve and what was the point? Was this a message?
“Gosling, you have achieved a state of enlightenment—”
“But how?” he snapped, annoyed and now angry. “All I have are questions! I have no answers! I don’t understand myself at the moment and nothing makes sense!”
Clearing her throat, Luna tried again, this time in a softer, more gentle voice. “You have achieved a state of enlightenment. You have become the sort of pony that your cutie mark wishes you to be. During a moment of great growth, or upon reaching some profound state of understanding, a cutie mark can glow. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does happen, it is a treasured, precious thing.”
“But… but… but…”—Gosling sputtered and battled to form a coherent sentence—“I don’t understand anything! I’ve only reached a place where I have nothing but questions! I’ve never been more uncertain in my life than I am right now! What meaning could this possibly have?”
Luna’s words—spoken but a short time ago—now echoed in his mind like overzealous alarm bells, drowning out all other thoughts with their sheer mental volume. I see the worst in the dreams of ponies! Whatever evidence of good there might be is tainted by the knowledge of evil! I believe in nothing! When Gosling thought of how this applied to him, his mouth went dry and he struggled in vain to make the pieces fit. Whatever good that Luna saw in him was corrupted by the darkness he held within—but she had trusted herself with him—she had her moment of faith and had to believe in something in spite of evidence to the contrary.
The light grew blinding and Gosling squinted while a crick settled into his neck from turning around to look at his own backside. Just when he didn’t think he could look any longer, the light subsided and his pair of rubber ducks no longer rivaled the sun for brilliance. What was the meaning? What was the point? What had just happened?
Though he was filled with more questions than answers, though everything was uncertain and unsettled, though nothing made sense, Gosling had an overwhelming compulsion to act, not as Gosling the pony, or Gosling of the Royal Guard, but as Confessor. A great mystery filled his being, flooded his mind, and indiscernible emotions filled his heart.
Whipping his head about, he gripped Luna with his wing, pulled her close, and looked her in the eye. “I will spend the rest of my life trying to prove worthy of your faith in me, Luna. Such a faith is to be acknowledged and rewarded. For in spite of all you’ve seen, all you’ve witnessed, for knowing all of my dark secrets, you chose to believe in me. It was a courageous act, Luna, and I will spend the rest of my life tending to the tiny, helpless flame that is your faith.”
“Thank you… Confessor…”