//------------------------------// // Chapter 2: Beneath The Mirror Lake // Story: The Glimmer Dilemma // by CartsBeforeHorses //------------------------------// Twilight Sparkle: What a strange new world I'm trying to make heads or tails of this strange new world Sorting through the small details of this strange new world What a strange new world. The song ”Strange New World” A snoozing Starlight Glimmer’s mind was ablaze with dozens of fleeting images. Farmers reaped a weary crop from frigid pink fields. Diamonds rained across the sky. Old spires fell, greeted with cheers like the new year. Two colors blended into indigo atop the sandy canvass. The fisher-minds cast out their thoughts and knew dolphin from shark. The dolphins were spared; the sharks were speared. Only grey this time. Dark clouds choked out life, but also restored it. The masses converged on a single point of fury. Nothing withstood it. These visions were both wonderful and horrible at the same time. Were they prophecy? Were they history? Starlight didn’t know, but she had the funny sense that she was somehow involved in those scenes… Her head jerked awake, bouncing off the rubber inner-tube. It was just a dream. It wasn’t any more disturbing than some others that she’d had, so she shrugged it off. The shimmering surface of the Last Prance Lake held Starlight’s inner-tube afloat. She stared at the ceiling where giant stalactites hung like icicles, flickering in the torch light. Starlight had been staring up all day, her first full day in Petra after resting at Maud’s Petran house the night before. Up was the one direction Starlight could look that made her feel like she was on a vacation. A vacation she wanted, instead of some political conflict she didn’t ask for. The other ponies around made Starlight feel like she was in an alternate universe where ponykind had split up into two different species. Two contrasting scenes played out. The first scene was on the shore, where a young adult mare with a sterling silver cutie mark stood, posing for a picture. Beside her was a burly stallion with a brown coat and a pickaxe cutie mark. Presumably her boyfriend. They smiled as a curly-haired pink mare with a corundum cutie mark took a picture with a high-tech camera: slim and metallic. The three were all giggling for seemingly no reason. Was something funny? Strangely, they weren’t speaking. Nopony around was. The second scene was a few feet from the three friends. A forlorn, cyan-coated pony with a sailboat cutie mark was sprawled on a beach towel. He chugged down the last of his apple schnapps like water in the desert, taking obnoxiously loud gulps. He tossed the empty bottle into the lake. Its splash sprayed cold water onto Starlight and another mare in an inner tube. “Watch it, you drunkard ass!” she shrieked, as if he’d punched her. Like Anthracite, she had Princess Luna’s anachronistic accent and annunciations, but without the thee’s and thou’s. Also, she shouted just like Luna. The mare grabbed the bottle and threw it back at the sailboat-marked stallion, and it smashed into pieces on the shore. Starlight glimpsed the mare’s flank… sure enough. Her mark was a collage of planets and stars invisible to Petra. The trio of photo-taking ponies didn’t notice anything. The pickaxe mark pony stood by the shore while his girlfriend snapped a solo picture of him. It was like they had no long-term memories, so they were meticulously documenting every moment. A stone minotaur golem shook the ground as it stepped between the drunk and the mare, ending the altercation. Starlight once again wondered how golems knew what actions to take. Could a golem act intelligently on its own? Or was it being controlled remotely by a distant cop? The cutie mark divide fascinated Starlight. The jovial, fun-loving ponies all had cutie marks of rock-related professions. These must’ve been the ponies who created mining golems, sent them to work, and then sat around. Obviously they’d be happy, Starlight thought. The depressed and angry ponies had cutie marks which couldn’t be lived out underground. Why didn’t these poor souls just leave Petra? Who was keeping them out… or in? Had the princesses cordoned off the mountain, or was it the Entrenchment Starlight had heard about? Either way, the divide was a horrendous chasm. A loud whistle tooted. Immediately, the ponies exited the lake and shore, walking off towards a distant building carved in the rock. Ponies were lining up in front of it. Starlight wondered if the lake was closed. However, nopony asked Starlight to leave. Now she was alone in the lake. “It’s 17:00, payday time! Aren’t you coming to get your weekly garnets?” a thirty-something aquamarine stallion with an airplane cutie mark shouted from the shore. Starlight zapped herself over to him, leaving her inner tube behind. “Woah! That’s rad. Never seen anypony teleport before,” he exclaimed, a grin on his face. His cutie mark was of an airplane. “Name’s High Flyer.” Starlight smiled back. “I’m Starlight Glimmer. Forgive the personal question, but I’m a cutie mark expert. Have you ever actually flown an airplane?” He gazed down, kicking the floor with his hoof. “No. It sucks. Don’t remind me of how bummed I always am.” “Why don’t you go above ground?” “I’m a Petran citizen. Equestria would deport me or interrogate me. So, the guards don’t usually let ponies leave unless they’re traders and smugglers, or reporters. Plus, the sandstorms are wicked brutal. Not all of us can teleport.” “I couldn’t even teleport such a vast distance,” said Starlight. “You’d have to make a golem like Maud Pie’s to cross that desert.” “Do you know Maud?” “She’s my friend. How do you know her?” “She’s helped ScryTech with lots of their gadgets, she’s prospected the last bit of pink diamonds to mine, and she’s a brilliant stand up comedienne.” Starlight laughed. “Quite the renaissance mare! I haven’t seen her perform, but she’s not too talkative. I’m guessing anecdotes and humorous rants are off the table.” “She only tells the most basic of jokes.” “And she has the most mysterious of rocks in her possession, the only thing I’ve seen that makes her smile.” “Oh, the Commander Stone?” High Flyer perked up. “She’s doing a demo of that later this week. We’ll all get to see what it can do.” “She didn’t tell me,” Starlight sighed. “I guess that even ‘friends’ don’t get sneak peaks.” High Flyer looked puzzled. “Why’d you say ‘friends’ like that?” “Maud brought me to this politically-charged city when she knows that I don’t do politics on vacation. I kind of had a… bad past with politics. I try to be neutral now. Not everyone can be the same.” “Props to that. Apolitical is a-okay.” Starlight smiled. “Really? You respect my choice? Most ponies ask me how I could possibly be neutral in the face of whatever they say is a major problem.” “I do respect your choice. I was neutral and very cynical for years, until the Sky Party came along. Anyways… It’s payday. Aren’t you getting those garnets?” Starlight laughed. “I don’t work here. I’m an outsider, as if my horn didn’t give it away.” High Flyer smiled. “One, you don’t need to work or live here to get garnets. Everypony in town gets free garnets every Friday… thanks to our mega-wealthy golem miners. Two, there’s unicorns and pegasi in Petra. Not many, but they exist. We’re a golem-based economy, and only earth pony magic can make golems.” Starlight nodded. “I understand now. I do need spending money while I’m here.” “Come on,” said High Flyer. Starlight and High Flyer walked in the direction of the garnet-dispensary. The line was incredibly long, so they sat down at a nearby bench to wait for it to shorten. “What do you spend your garnets on?” asked Starlight. High Flyer shrugged. “Drugs, booze, gambling, prostitutes... I’ve swung ‘em all, sister! It’s all getting old, though, so I just dump the garnets in my bathtub now. Maybe if I ever leave Petra, I can buy a plane. I’ve done everything there is to do down here, said everything there is to say… most of us have, and most ponies have just stopped talking entirely. It’s super boring.” She laughed. “Nopony in Last Prance except you has even said hello to me. I was starting to think that you’d all taken vows of silence like the Kirin.” He shook his head no. “I think you mean ‘Qilin,’ but maybe that term is out of date. Anywho, Petrans are all telepathic, so there’s many things that you and I can’t hear. Even for us, though, speech is--” Starlight put her hoof up. “Wait, wait, wait. You’re all telepathic? How?” he thought to her. Starlight chuckled. “I know how telepathy works. I meant, how do all Petrans have such a rare ability?” High Flyer grinned. “Our ancestors were the alicorns’ siblings: birthed from the god and goddess Terrarch and Primehoof. We got earth pony DNA, they got pegasus and unicorn DNA; they got immortality, we got long mortal lifespans... but we all got innate telepathy. They were only female and couldn’t reproduce. Our ancestors were both sexes and had lots of kids. We wanted democracy and earth magic freedom. They wanted monarchy and for earth ponies to mostly be serfs and manual laborers. Naturually, war broke out. They won the Regal War, they’re in Canterlot; we lost the war, we’re banished under a mountain. It’s an armistice that’s in place to this day, with no treaty.” Starlight blinked. “I didn’t know that Luna and Celestia had siblings. Are there any other superpowers that you inherited, besides telepathy?” “Nope. Everything else we can do, a trained earth pony could do. Look at Maud; she’s not Petran.” “She sounded just like you do, criticizing Petran life as no life at all.” “Yep. Like I said, I’ve done everything.” He started rattling off, “I’ve been to all five states in the Petran Republic: Alabastra, Darklahoma, Last Prance, Rockistan, Volcansk, and every city within them. I’ve had sex with every mare in Petra who said yes. I’ve worked every job that I’m qualified for. I’ve read every book that I can. Seen every band, watched every play and movie. I even played dodgeball with dynamite once.” “But... why?” Starlight asked, her head jolting. He smiled. “Just because.” High Flyer and Starlight arrived at the stone-carved garnet dispensary. A giant wooden sign read “Garnet Allotments” in red letters. At least, that’s what Starlight thought it said, it was written in bizarre text. ꝽARNЭT A⅃OTMЭNTʃ The line snaked around the block. Outside, Trixie Lulamoon stood, giving flyers to ponies in line. She was doing a few cantrips for attention, like basic levitation tricks. Trixie beamed, gesturing to the ponies in line with an outstretched hoof. “Be sure not to miss Sunday’s magic show, starring a real unicorn… the Great and Powerful Trixie!” She glanced over at Starlight and smiled. “Starlight! Where’ve you been? I haven’t seen you since I ran off and started planning this show!” Starlight chuckled. “And whose fault is that?” Trixie gave Starlight and High Flyer each a flyer. MAꝽIC ŞOW OF A LIFETIME ÞЭ ꝽREAT & POWERFUL TRIXIE, A REAL UNICORN! A picture of Trixie surrounded by magic dust and fireworks. TЭЯIFIC TRICKʃ! HEART-ʃTOPPINꝽ ʃTUNTʃ! ALL AGЭʃ! ADMIßION ONLY 200 GARNЭTʃ! LAST PRANCE ARENA AT 16:00 ÞIʃ ʃUNDAY ʃUNDAY ʃUNDAY! “I can’t read this very well. Is this on Sunday?” Starlight snarked. “Trixie, I’d like you to meet High Flyer.” Trixie walked over and shook his hoof. “I’ll totes go to your show. Something new is always cool.” Trixie giggled. “It’s funny. You sound like Rarity, but you use slang like Rainbow Dash.” “Who are they?” asked High Flyer. Trixie blinked. “The Elements of Harmony, of course. Equestria’s sole line of defense against evil. Well, besides Trixie and Starlight, that is.” She smiled in a self-congratulatory manner. Starlight blushed. High Flyer laughed. “Oh, you mean those ponies. Equestria’s famous jewelry-armed hit squad. I knew of the group, but not their names. That ‘sole defense of Equestria’ part is very true. Petra’s defense relies on more powerful ponies than just a few, ever since the Regal War.” Starlight knew very well about her friends’ absolute necessity to Equestria's past and future, and Equestria's massive reliance on them, but she didn’t care to bring it up. “So does Petra do, like, all that friendship stuff that Equestria does?” asked Trixie. High Flyer looked puzzled. “I dunno how to answer. Are you asking if Petrans have friendships? Of course. I'd like to think I'm making friends right now! I thought friendship was a common thing everywhere.” Trixie shook her head. “Well yeah, but... Trixie means, do you make everything about friendship’s importance? Is Petra run based on friendship?” The line inched along. Nopony else had seemed interested in the trio’s discussion thus far. Perhaps, like High Flyer, they’d seen and heard it all. He gazed seriously at Starlight and Trixie. “You gotta promise you won't get mad at me.” They both nodded. He said in a serious but calm tone, “Petrans don’t make everything about friendship. In Equestria, it’s a cult. Making friends with everypony around doesn’t improve friendship; it dilutes wine with vinegar. I’d rather have just three good friends than thirteen okay friends. When you and your next-door neighbor call each other ‘friend,’ that’s weird. I’ve read loads of Equestrian books, and I’ve seen the word ‘friend’ a million times, but the word ‘acquaintance’ barely shows up. I've even heard that there's entire schools in Equestria just for friendship. Which might be why Equestria’s technology lags behind Petra’s.” Trixie grinned deviously at Starlight. “Oh, Trixie agrees, friendship schools are lame.” Slightly embarrassed, Starlight asked, “If you don’t have the national ethos of friendship, then don’t you all have a bunch of disagreements with each other?” High Flyer smiled. “That’s the cool thing! Our country is a democracy with civil discourse and debate, not a monarchy with hate speech laws. To us, a bunch of opinions is better than unanimity. Disagreements are how voters are exposed to ideas which might change their minds. Our government only has validity if everyone takes part. “The Alicorn Regime has no choice but to promote ‘friendship.’ To allow even a pinch of disagreement could threaten their rule. Ponies might get mad at the same old royal laws and decrees that they can’t change. The Regime has lasted a thousand years. They’re not stupid. The pimping of friendship is a facade.” “Oooh, burn!” Trixie grinned with glee. “Trixie likes you, High Flyer. Starlight, you’ve got a good acquaintance here, best keep him.” Starlight forced an uncertain smile. Friendship was a very nuanced and valuable area of study, she believed. Indeed, by embracing friendship, Starlight herself was saved from Tartarus where she would’ve otherwise ended up, and allowed to be a free pony. Princess Celestia was always bountifully merciful towards even the most wicked of wicked, so long as they were willing to repent. Would a dictator be so compassionate? Starlight tried to speak but was cut off as a pony spoke behind her. “What's this I hear, High Flyer? Are you corrupting these outsiders?” A grinning, rose-colored earth mare approached. She wore a camera around her neck and a beach towel over her back, which obscured her cutie mark. Her face was gaunt and partially covered by her golden curls. High Flyer chuckled. “No, Rose Gold. I'm just expanding their minds.” High Flyer and Rose Gold bumped hooves. Were they friends? Maybe just acquaintances, Starlight thought. It was an uncommon word in Equestria, but not unheard of. “You’re expanding their minds? Hah! At least you haven’t given them any of your drugs. You know ESM is safer, right?” High Flyer’s face darkened. “I only use drugs ‘cause I’m insanely bored, and I don’t want to use psychic tricks to fool my own mind into being happy. ESM is basically a drug, so you’re hypocritical. After seventy years of this Petran drudgery, I’ll literally die of boredom. How are you still entertained by that camera and that piss pond? Are you a goldfish, or do you have autism?” Starlight was surprised to hear High Flyer talk in such an irate tone. He’d been nothing but nice to herself and Trixie. Rose Gold smiled. “I’m no autistic goldfish. I appreciate our society’s great wealth and National Opulence, and I don’t take a moment for granted. I don’t have any psychotic delusions about ruining the Opulence with a bloody Second Regal War. It would be a wholesale slaughter of the population of a primitive society that still has thatched roofs and steam trains. For what? We have nothing in common with Equestrians, besides that we’re all ponies.” Trixie and Starlight blinked. Rose Gold looked at them with an arrogant smile, as if she had personally invented all of Petra’s technology and earned all its wealth. “No offense to you, of course,” she said. High Flyer snarled. “Maybe some of us wanna be part of that ‘primitive society’ because it’s our birthright promised land, and Equestrians are our blood brothers. We can cure their medieval darkness by dethroning their medieval monarchs… peacefully, with a treaty. We Sky Party voters see violence as a last resort, even though the Entrenchment Party frames us as psychotic warmongers. Especially now that the Sky Party and President Block are in power, you’re all desperate.” Rose Gold shook her head. “If you hold a gun to a pony and ask him to do something, that’s violence. How will you convince the glacial alicorns? Will you ask nicely, ‘please step down, allow democracy, and unite Petra and Equestria?’ No, because that’s never worked with them. You want to make violent threats, or veiled threats based on our military supremacy. That will scare the alicorns, then they’ll crash the moon into this mountain because they’re too stubborn to understand wisdom, justice, and moderation. Terrarch help us. We must preserve the armistice of the Regal War.” Starlight cut in, “Princess Celestia isn’t a thousand-foot-tall gorilla. The princesses treat us very kindly, though maybe you’d call that a veneer. I’ve met the princesses, and their minds can be changed. I’ve done it before. Maybe if an outsider like me tells Celestia how dire the situation in Petra is, she’ll reconsider. I plan to tell her the next time I see her; last night Maud mentioned some sort of talks.” Trixie laughed, “It’s ironic, Starlight. You’re the strongest unicorn in the world, even more than Twilight in my opinion, and you’ve fought ‘The Mare’ before. If you negotiate with the prin--alicorns, it’s just like the Petrans doing it. There’s a veiled threat that you’ll do something about it yourself, ‘cause you’re such a loose cannon. Which is why I like you.” Rose Gold smiled. “Powerful Equestrians are willing to stick up for us now, eh? Maybe you aren’t as brainwashed by the Regime as I thought. I am glad that you’re on our side, Starlight, or at least neutral, should the shooting ever start.” “I’m neutral, I would never join on either side, should fighting start,” said Starlight. “I don’t do wars. Good vs. evil, maybe… but not when it’s grey vs. grey, as this war would be.” “So, if Starlight succeeds, if the Sky Party succeeds, and we do bring a peaceful reunification, then what’s wrong with that, Rose Gold?” asked High Flyer. She shook her head. “Even without violence, reunification would still be a disaster. Equestrians would immigrate into Petra for our Opulence, but they’d introduce new infectious diseases, and they’d destroy our unique culture. Petrans would emigrate to Equestria for its vast landscape and sky, but we’d introduce technology that the Equestrians aren’t ready for yet, we’d bring our diseases, and we’d destroy their unique culture. Ore and gem prices would drop if golems were allowed in Equestrian mines, and that would destroy our economy. “The Entrenchment is the only political doctrine which acknowledges Petra’s democratic and technological exceptionalism. All nations, including Equestria, have the right to self-determination and a preservation of their cultures. They have the right to discover for themselves how to reach our level of development. We all mustn’t interfere.” “I want the hell out of here! Unchain my soul!” High Flyer shouted. A couple of ponies in line turned their heads to glance at him, and then shrugged as they turned back. Was this normal to them? At this point, Trixie ducked out to go promote her show elsewhere, silently waving bye to Starlight. High Flyer ranted, “What damn culture do we have? Our weirdo, ink-saving alphabet? Our outdated accents? The hundred different dishes we’ve made from apples because we’ve had nothing else to eat? Our drug culture where 35% of us are alcoholics, 10% addicted to heroin? Abortion rates at 25% because we’d rather kill babies than have them be born in this hellhole? Those things aren’t a culture. I won’t be your economic protectionist prisoner! I won’t stand here as your little cultural totem pole! Your mineral deposits are running out; you’re mining this mountain so much that it’ll collapse and kill us all!” Rose Gold rolled her eyes. “The mountain collapsing hasn’t been geologically proven. We have a two-hundred year time frame for proven mineral reserves. But go on, you’re being very entertaining.” High Flyer continued, “More and more fillies and colts are getting cutie marks that have nothing to do with your Opulence. We all can’t be like you, Rose Gold. The Sky Party is in power. The whole system’s gonna crash down, and your Entrenchment will turn to dust. Petrans will finally see the sky again. And you know what I wait for the most when that day comes, when we break through our stable door? You’ll finally get to see the sky, feel the breeze, and breathe in the fresh air. Then, you’ll have to either admit that you were wrong, or tell me that you’d rather live underground.” “You know what I wait for most, High Flyer?” asked Rose Gold. “When you finally resolve your cognitive dissonance and learn to live life in the now. When you quit seeing your cutie mark as a torture device attached to your flank, as a magnet drawing you to the unattainable sky. When you see that happiness is all in the mind and doesn’t have to be chained to reality. In a moment it could happen, High Flyer. You could wake up and be happy. I wait for that moment.” A few moments of silence ensued. By this point, Starlight and High Flyer had advanced in line to where they were next to go into the door. High Flyer said, “So, Starlight and I are next to get our garnets now. I guess I’ll see you at some point later in the week?” “Of course,” said Rose Gold. “I’m going on a business trip to Alabastra, but I’ll be back. I hope that you come up with some better talking points between now and then.” “Oh, the case for our freedom is endless. Maybe next time we can talk about how our equine DNA literally requires us to live in open spaces.” “I look forward to it, High Flyer.” They bumped hooves, and Rose Gold walked off. “Wow. I thought that Trixie and I argued a lot,” said Starlight. “You have a friend who all you do together is argue?” High Flyer shrugged. “That and go to concerts together. Why not? She’s one of the few Entrenchment ponies who gives a damn enough to form a legit argument. The others just lie numb in the pool, use garbage consumer goods and parlor tricks to fool themselves into being ‘happy,’ and pull the Entrenchment voting lever like trained lab rats getting food. Science and reason mean diddly-squat to them. Rose Gold’s preservation of her mind in the face of all that, and her successful jewelry business as well? She’s a remarkable pony, and only a fool would deny it.” “Terrarch dammit! Why don’t you two just go inside?” an angry old stallion shouted from behind them. The line was piling up behind them. Starlight and High Flyer walked inside, where they found a vending box made of rock with a hoof-sized slot towards the bottom. “You just swipe your hoof underneath and out pops your garnets,” High Flyer explained. Starlight waved her hoof inside of the slot. A red light flashed across it. The machine whirred and clicked, and a burlap pouch plopped down. She floated it up and opened the drawstring. Inside were hundreds of pea-sized gems with a deep red hue. “One thousand garnets exactly,” said High Flyer. “It used to be five hundred, but they raised it ‘cause inflation in Petra is so high, it’s higher than I am. Y’know, since the golems mine these things by the bucketload.” Starlight asked, “How much are garnets worth in Equestrian bits?” “Five PTG per EQB, but you’d have to go to Canterlot or Manehattan to find an appraiser and a trader willing to buy that much garnet,” said High Flyer. “It fluctuates based on the jewelry and abrasives market.” Starlight rolled her eyes. “Let me guess, you’ve been a currency trader, too?” High Flyer nodded, smiling. On the other side of Last Prance, there stood a few blocks of nice-looking apartments carved into the cavern. There were also a rare few freestanding buildings, which had marble columns and gardens, and weren’t connected with the cave walls at all. Such homes were valuable because you couldn’t hear neighbors through the walls, High Flyer had said. High Flyer and Starlight sat down at a nearby al fresco café called “The Splendor Block.” What a terrible pun, Starlight thought. Technically, nothing in Last Prance could be considered outdoor dining, but High Flyer and Starlight didn’t have to enter a sub-cave or building, so she considered the patio to be ‘outside.’ She had to admit, the lack of sunlight was getting to her. High Flyer was seventy years old, though his thirty-something looks were deceiving. How had he put up with it for so long? The dining patio was unnaturally well lit, just like a sunny day. Green shrubbery ringed the premises. The smell of flowers filled Starlight’s nose. Small birds in golden cages tweeted birdsongs. And there was somehow, of all things, a pleasant breeze which was localized entirely on the patio. “The Splendour Block serves up lots of treats from the outside,” said High Flyer. “This is a fancy place, about 100 garnets a plate.” “I’m on vacation, and I just got free money, so I’m not too worried. I guess we’ll get great service because nopony else is here,” she gestured at the empty tables. High Flyer nodded. “A lot of the regulars were Last Prance mining elites. They stopped coming here after the owner, Cinder Block, became president. I don’t care, because I wouldn’t sit next to those rich losers anyway.” The waitress approached the table. She was a pegasus… the most gorgeous pegasus that Starlight had ever seen. Her body was cream-white and seemed to glow. Her slender legs, neck, and curvy barrel were the epitome of the feminine form. The feathers of her outstretched wings were fluffy like a pair of slippers, and they ended in yellow tips. But her mane stole the show. It was stylized in the pink, purple, and orange manner of a sunrise, with all the nuances and variations. “My favorite customer,” she said in a smoky voice with a foreign accent, giving High Flyer a hoof bump. She glanced at Starlight. “My name is Sunrise, and I’ll be your waitress today. Can I get you started with a Canyish wine to drink, or perhaps some rain water from the ether?” “Water is fine to start,” said Starlight. Sunrise grabbed a glass from her saddlebag and placed it on the table. She intently gazed at it for a second, and a tiny rain cloud appeared and filled up the glass. Starlight’s jaw dropped. “Wait, how did you do that? And why is there a breeze in here? How did you get the patio bright without a bunch of lamps? That’s powerful magic.” “Oh, do you not like it? My apologies.” The breeze instantly stopped, and the patio dimmed. Starlight shook her head. “Oh no, I do like it. I was just wondering why--and how--it was there.” “My special talent permits me to change the weather conditions inside a hundred-foot radius surrounding me, with my thoughts alone. Sunny or cloudy, breezy or still, rain or snow. In the winter, I make a lot of snow for the children in deserts or underground who’ve never viewed it. In the droughted areas, I fly above and bring rain. I shall brighten up the darkest of places with my own special sunrise. Of all places, Petra needs it the most.” Starlight smiled. “That’s really neat! You have a nice accent, too. Where are you from?” “I’m from Saddle Arabia. I’m seen as a hero there, because I helped stop a drought. A few years ago, before he became president, I met Cinder Block while he was trying to smuggle Arabian oil barrels into Petra. He told me about Petra’s plight and hinted that I might apply for Permitted Outsider status, hence I felt that it was my mission from God to help. Anthracite’s bureau allowed me to stay here, because I persuaded him that my presence would enhance Petra.” “Wait, the President of Petra used to be a smuggler?” asked Starlight. “He ran a large smuggling enterprise,” said Sunrise. “Petra has many regulations for what may be traded. Quotas, tariffs, outright bans. The Entrenchment passed those laws because they didn’t want Petrans getting to know a taste of what the outside was like. Then they might all get uppity with thoughts of rejoining Equestria. Block was a smuggler, but he wasn’t an official, government-sanctioned smuggler. So he didn’t smuggle in ‘approved’ goods like apples, oak, or grains. He smuggled in exotic goods like honeydew, mahogany, sweet crude oil, books, even pornography.” High Flyer said, “Everything she just said is true. Who’d have thought that Block would outsmart the Petran Smuggling Bureau to get his goods in here, and then outsmart the Entrenchment establishment to become president? Legit sunlight shining underground. If anypony can fix Petra’s plight and stand up to the Alicorn Regime, Cinder Block and the Sky Party can.” Sunrise nodded in agreement. “I’ve traveled all around the world. I’ve seen regimes toppled. I’ve seen monarchies crumbling everywhere; kings and queens are going out of style. I’ve seen people rise and win their freedom. The case of Petra is the grandest display unfolding which I’ve seen in ages. The lines are falling in delightful ways! Yet, I’m just an observer. As a citizen of the world, I have no right to alter the politics of any country I visit. Anyway…” She glanced at her watch. “...May I take your order?” Starlight blinked. “Uh… surprise me. Wait, you already have. Both of you. With every word you’ve said!” All three of them laughed. Starlight Glimmer was ravenously hungry, but she slowed herself down to savor the delicious meal. It was a plate of neatly arranged spicy peppers cooled off with a whitish-blue sauce, intermixed with fava beans. It was served with a side of fluffy, slightly sweet honey-bread. The dish was called something that Starlight couldn’t even pronounce. It melted in her mouth. Meanwhile, High Flyer was eating a plate of falafel. Both had wine to drink; Starlight felt like she deserved a few glasses. At dessert time, a group of ponies had sat down at a table near Starlight and High Flyer. He knew them from elsewhere and didn’t like them, calling them ‘total dunkasses.’ So High Flyer had requested that Starlight and himself speak via telepathy. Starlight was not a telepath, but since High Flyer was, she could still deliberately ‘think at’ him and he would receive it. It was weird for Starlight, being able to speak her mind in the presence of strangers. She asked High Flyer, He blinked. Starlight shrugged. Her thoughts fizzled, and High Flyer nodded in an understanding way. Starlight regathered her façade, a difficult task with how much she’d had to drink, combined with telepathy’s intimate potential. Even after her reform, Starlight was still just as passionate about justice, fairness, and righteousness as ever. She also still felt so much shame for what she did, that some nights she drowned in regret. But no one wants to be friends with a firebrand or a sad sack. Sometimes Starlight felt like both. She continued, “Hmm,” Starlight mused. Starlight laughed. High Flyer smiled. He paused for a moment, and his eyes started to glaze over with tears. Starlight leaned forward in concern. Was he okay? <...That’s why, sometimes, I want to kill myself. I can’t fly down here, and I’ve exhausted every boring thing to keep my mind busy. Maybe if I die, I can soar through the air as a ghost or one of Terrarch’s angels...> He gazed down, staring into his empty wine glass. Starlight nodded and felt like she had some personal experience to relate for once. She gave him a moment. She said, High Flyer’s jaw dropped. She explained, High Flyer’s eyes widened. Starlight paused. High Flyer grinned, his tears ceasing. Starlight shrugged. Now it was High Flyer who consoled Starlight. Starlight asked. She wanted to believe that something good came of those timeline shifts. High Flyer nodded. He laughed out loud. She snickered. He pondered for a moment. She smiled. High Flyer insisted on picking up the bill, even though Starlight had just gotten free money. He was such a nice person. What a shame that he couldn’t live his dreams. If something did that to Starlight, wasting and limiting her potential, she’d never let it pass. Starlight had rediscovered her uniqueness after her town collapsed and her revenge plot failed. After that, she felt that she’d been freed from her own self-imposed prison. She didn’t have to live for some messed-up ideology, or be bound by her past; she could live for who she was today.. High Flyer wasn’t living as who he was today. He was a prisoner of society, a prisoner of history, bound by the ancient armistice of the Regal War a thousand years ago. The war never ended with a peace treaty. It made Starlight furious just thinking about it, maybe because she was drunk at the moment, or maybe because this was the biggest injustice she’d ever seen. Even still, Petra wasn't Starlight’s country. How could she interfere? Sunrise was right. Besides, Starlight hadn’t even talked to the Princesses yet. She suspected what they might say, though… the exact opposite of what High Flyer or Maud had to say. Opposites were a recurring theme here. In Petra, Starlight felt as though she were viewing something like Equestria, but seen through the viridian surface of a mirror lake. The mirror duplicated Petra in Equestria’s image, but it reversed everything in its reflection. From the backwards alphabet to the inverted system of rule by the many ponies instead of the few princesses. In Petra, the sky was rock, emotions were playthings, and talk was expensive. Petra was like its own planet: a world where madness plays, a world where hope's enslaved. Last Prance reminded Starlight of her own town, a place with all the life and joy sucked out of it. Except no evil magician had done this to them. A complicated geo-political situation, advanced technology, and a unique philosophy had all blended into one toxic mix. Starlight did not view this as solely a friendship problem. Beneath their stone-cold surface, Petrans could be just as friendly as Equestrians. The Cutie Map hadn’t sent Starlight or her friends here, because it would take way more than six or seven ponies to solve the Petran crisis. In addition to friendship, sometimes it takes wading through history, culture, religion--even politics--to solve a problem. For once, Starlight was eagerly awaiting the negotiations. Their results could spark a new life for her new friend. That, or the talks could fail, and it would start a catastrophic war.