Water brushed against the hull of the Immortal Dream, guiding it westward along the river to the sea.
The power was off, Gerardo having decided the refill to their mana core Chauncey gave them needed to be preserved. No light shone from the crystal-studded cage that once held a harmonic comet, and belowdecks the lights were off and the windows wide, leaving just enough darkness to sleep in, yet enough light not to trip.
Starlight sat at the ship's railing watching the shore go by, Gerardo's constant steering preventing them from being grounded as the river carried them along. Her tail flicked idly and her ears stayed perked, watching as homesteads and farmland and wilderness with no population whatsoever scrolled past. It was an endless montage of creatures living, places they had lived, and lands yet to be lived in, secluded and isolated from the rest of the world by vast amounts of physical space.
She had an airship. Before that, she had had her legs, and they had carried her across a distance no mortal had traveled before. Griffons and pegasi had wings, but... the ship passed an earth pony kicking at a fruit tree, and Starlight wondered if they had lived there their whole life.
"It makes you feel tiny, doesn't it?" Maple murmured, walking silently up beside her and sitting down, wrapping her tail around Starlight's back.
"Huh?" Starlight glanced up at her, shifting closer in welcome.
"Watching everything out here go by," Maple continued. "Riverfall and Ironridge were cities. We made them the way we wanted, and everything outside them was just a place you didn't go. Growing up, I read a lot of books and listened to the Sosan sailors with Willow, and there were always so many stories about the things beyond our borders. But all we could really see was forest and jungle and broken rock. Me and Amber and Willow took a trip once, years ago, after we had decided we weren't going to Ironridge but before Willow had Alder, where we took the boat Amber had been making and went south, upstream to the base of the mountains. It took several days and was quite the journey, but it was our first and only experience of the world outside ours. We were so impressed by how big it was."
Starlight watched a cute little house on a riverbank hilltop go by, a hammock strung between two likely-planted trees outside, nodding to show she was listening.
"But now that I've been to Ironridge and spent a month on an airship, and seen the sea and this empire and how old and spread-out everything is..." Maple hummed to herself a little. "Ponies and griffons have been here for thousands of years. I suppose I expected the empire to look like Ironridge all the way through, with some places for growing food but people everywhere and in control of everything. Instead, it's like they spread out as much as they can and have all the time in the world to do it, and can't even cover it. There are cities you can see from end to end of just by turning your head, and there are plains and fields and forests like these and the ones outside Riverfall and Ironridge where there's just nobody. The world is just that much bigger than everything every person put together can be... It's beautiful, but it makes me feel tiny. We could jump off this ship together, right here, walk a few miles and then cut down some trees to build a house and never have to worry about trouble again."
"It does, huh?" Starlight folded her ears. "It makes me feel the opposite."
"Oh?" Maple gave her a curious nudge. "How so?"
"Because as big as it is, it doesn't stop us." Starlight gazed to the side, looking downriver at the horizon they were sailing to. "Everyone else, maybe, but they live their lives and they don't care. I didn't like it in Equestria, so I came to Riverfall, and it didn't matter how big or empty the mountains were. We wanted more than Riverfall, so we went to Ironridge, and we wanted more than Ironridge so we came all the way out here. Now Valey is missing and Chauncey says she was taken far to the west, so we're sailing out this way so she can do her thing and smell me so we can pick her up. We can move around and travel to do whatever we want, and the world just gives us room to do that. It's ours."
Maple gave a soft giggle. "Hmm. If the world was alive, I wonder what it would think of that. Or us. Do you think it would find us funny, or annoying, or endearing, or in need of help?"
Starlight raised an eyebrow. "Why are you thinking about this, anyway? How few ponies there are compared to how big the world is? Maybe it's just the way things are."
"Because I grew up in a town," Maple murmured, "and in that town everyone lived close by and if you walked down a street, you'd probably see someone you knew. So this isn't the way things have been for me. I wonder what it would be like, and I can't tell if it would be the nicest thing in the world, having just us and a few others we trusted completely... or terribly lonely."
Starlight's ears fell. "I thought you were trying not to think about how few ponies there were."
For a moment, Maple was silent. "Because of what Gerardo and I found in the population data? About how... low the survival rate was?"
"Yeah."
"It's okay." Maple nudged her. "Seeing the whole world so much emptier than I expected, thinking about it... It makes it feel... less like there was something I could have done. I don't know, Starlight, I'm just trying to find healthy ways to cope. Something better than spending a year or two laying in my bed when there are friends who need me."
Starlight wanted to ask if she was finding that, but couldn't think of a way to put the words to her tongue that would convey what she felt. Instead, she settled for leaning against Maple and closing her eyes. "I need you."
"I need you, too," Maple whispered. "And I'm glad to have you, Starlight."
There was a pause, and then Maple continued. "Something I did in Riverfall while I was getting better was, every time I felt so sad about something that it was like there could never be anything good again, I tried to find something beautiful in it. I didn't always find something, or feel what I found, and many times Amber or Willow had to sit there and help me, but it did help when I could believe it. And there shouldn't be anything beautiful about that many dead foals... but..." She bowed her head. "I can think of things. Seeing how spread-out the world is like this, it wouldn't be possible if there were so many more ponies each generation. The world would be such a different place. If we're so small and so far apart... doesn't that make having each other so much more significant?" A tear dropped on Starlight's head, and she realized Maple was crying. "You came all the way across those mountains to find me, Starlight. It's so special."
"Yeah," Starlight repeated, also at a whisper.
"And now we're going across a continent to get Valey back, because friends just aren't replaceable." Maple squeezed her shoulder. "Maybe having less and having lost things lets us appreciate more what we have. And... with numbers like those..." She shuddered. "There are probably a lot of other mares out there who know how I feel."
Starlight hesitated for a moment. "So... you feel better? You're not sad about Aspen anymore?"
"Yes. I feel better." Maple held her close. "But I'm also still sad. I just wanted to tell you what I was feeling, and thank you for being here. Losing someone I cared so much about and looked forward to caring about so much... Mmm."
"Stay here a while?" Starlight asked, patting the ground.
Maple shuffled again, getting a more comfortable position. "I don't see why not."