She woke up at nine again. Each morning, she could not help but feel a little sorry for ponies who weren't unicorns; she simply walked out the door, and all her things assembled themselves in mid air. Her saddlebags filled themselves, library books on the right, books from her personal collection, quills, an inkbottle, parchment, and a sandwich on the left. Like always.
The sun was shining outside, and the streets busy. She tuned out all the conversations around her, listening only to the clinking of her shoes. She preferred the city by night. There were fewer ponies around then.
At least libraries were alright, despite being public places. There were ponies around, yes, but they didn't try to talk to her, which was a blessing. And of course the books made up for the inconvenience of their presence.
She arrived at the library after the too-long walk there. She was greeted by the librarian at the front desk whose name she did not know, but whose face she did, with a "hey" as she walked in. Her favorite spot was open, so she claimed it, spreading notebooks and scrolls across the desk, and hanging her bags—it was a relief to have the weight off her back—on the chair. Having staked her claim, she set out wandering the stacks.
Though she had a list with her, ostensibly to remind her what books she was looking for, she did not read it. She kept those lists only out of habit; had she left it behind it would have made no difference. Especially since only half the books she pulled were on the list.
Then back to the desk, back through the thick air, full of that old, sweet smell of dusty paper, carried in the currents almost palpably convecting away from the bars of hot sunlight that walled off shelves from each other.
Inevitably she would find a reason to go back looking for additional books once she had settled in. The argument building in her notes would come to depend on a passage referencing something she had not read, and a nagging suspicion would tell her to go look it up, make sure everything was sound; even worse was when the allusion was to something she had read but did not have to hoof. Many times she was content to trust the author that he knew his subject, but when things fell in the scope of her own knowledge she did not extend the same trust to her memory.
And so the day went by, the heavens turning above, and the pages turning below.
Moondancer was lost to that world. She was in a realm of ideas; it was a much better state than what most of life was, when you could simply abstract over all the messiness of words, sentences, paragraphs, and even the pens and ponies that had produced them. Moondancer was in a realm of ideas, pure and plain, where her troubles could not reach her. But more important than her troubles were what the books (distantly) had to say to her. Great chains of argument and logic unfolded before her, and not one link did she leave unexamined, but one after one after one——
"Miss Moondancer? The library is closed. You really have to go this time," the soft voice of the librarian said.
It was a soft voice, but to Moondancer it rang out like a trumpet, bringing all her thoughts crashing down. The nib of her quill snapped as she tried capture the dissolving wisps her ideas had suddenly been reduced to.
Her face met the desk; she groaned loudly. She did not bother to argue with the librarian. It had never worked before, and she was suddenly exhausted. She sluggishly lifted her head. The library was mostly dark now. Her desk lamp was a dim island. She stuffed her notes into her bags, along with a few choice books, left her desk, head hanging low, and plodded out of the library.
The street outside was actually brighter than where she had squirreled herself away for her research. But she did not notice that; she was barely aware she was walking. She was right back up in her head, trying to recreate the thoughts of a few minutes ago. In vain. She had lost the trail she had followed to get there, and her tiredness threw shade over everything she could see.
She walked the streets of Canterlot, her hooves moving automatically. She had tread the path between her house and the library so many times she could have done it in her sleep—which was good, because that was more or less what she was doing. But even though she knew the route so well that it had been worn into her brain as much as it had into the pavement, it had always been about the destination and not the journey, so that she couldn't have told you a single thing about anything on the way.
So she didn't notice the nightclub she passed, and she certainly did not notice the unicorn trotting out through the doors and directly into her path.
For the second time that night, Moondancer was violently dragged out of her head and into reality. She collided with the unicorn, knocking them both to the ground.
"Hey watch where you're going!" the other mare said.
"S-sorry," Moondancer said. As she stood up, she felt something crunch under her hoof.
"Aw man!" the mare said, pushing her back to examine whatever it was she had stepped on.
Moondancer craned her head to look. She felt her cheeks burning. The mare was cradling a pair of violet sunglasses, one lens of which was now spiderwebbed with cracks. "Oh Luna, I'm so sorry!" she stammered, cowering.
Her face must have been pitiful to look at, because the Unicorn's glare softened instantly when their eyes met. Or when she tried to meet Moondancer's eyes: the poor mare kept turning her head, like their gazes were like poles of a magnet.
"Whoa, hey there, it's okay," the mare said, reaching out her hoof. Her tone was softer now.
Moondancer's breathing finally started to slow down. She stood up, though her legs were still shaky.
"You gonna be okay?" Moondancer nodded. The mare lifted her sunglasses in her magic, examining them. She sighed. "These are really busted, huh?" She added: "My name's Vinyl, by the way."
In sequence, Moondancer squeaked, blurted out a "sorry!", and then, composing herself, said "I can fix it."
"What was that?" Vinyl said, "I didn't quite hear you."
"I can fix your glasses. I know a spell for it."
"Well cool! Isn't that convenient. The one mare I run into out here is the one mare who can fix these things." Vinyl chuckled. "Go right ahead."
Moondancer closed her eyes and focused. It had been a while since she had broken her own glasses, so it took a moment to remember the spell. Even if it was an easy one. It was easy. The kind of spell you could cast ten times without breaking a sweat. The only problem with reading as much as she did was that there were so many things in her head that it was sometimes hard to recall specific little facts. This would be so much easier if Vinyl would just stop staring at her. She was sure she was staring at her. It had been a long time, at least a minute, and she hadn't done a thing. She was probably getting impatient. Or thinking that she had just been bragging or looking for an excuse. She wasn't. She knew the spell. She had it written down right at the beginning of her favorite notebook. All she had to do was visualize the page. The page. Not the mare staring at her. The mare whose glasses she had broken. The mare who was saying:
"Uh, are you sure you're okay? Because if this is a hard spell, I can just go get them repaired tomorrow."
"No!" Moondancer said. "I just—I can't remember the spell right now." Her ears were pressed flat against her head. The heat that had been burning in her face swelled. She attempted a smile, "But that doesn't matter! My house is really close. Just come with me and I'll have these as good as new." Her voice was a wobbling thing.
"Come back to your place? Hey, at least buy me dinner first." Vinyl smirked as she sidled up alongside Moondancer.
"Sure, I guess if you wan—" Moondancer froze as she realized what she had said. The impulse to curl into a ball became ever stronger. She could feel herself sweating.
Vinyl slapped her on the shoulder, "I'm just kidding, don't worry."
Moondancer nodded and swallowed. She led Vinyl on, not trusting her self to talk anymore. As they walked anxiety grew alongside her embarrassment. What was she doing? She was leading a complete stranger to her house. She stole a glance at Vinyl, who had her broken glasses, the cause of all this, perched on her forehead above her horn. She was humming something to herself.
As much as Moondancer wanted to stop, she didn't see how she could. What would that mare think if she just ran away? She was probably laughing at her already. What was she thinking about her, the way those red eyes were flashing in the streetlights. There was no turning back.
Vinyl wasn't saying anything to her. Moondancer was grateful for that much. Things were awkward enough as it was without small talk. Whether the reason Vinyl wasn't talking was because she sensed that, or because she thought Moondancer was that much of a weirdo and wanted to avoid interacting with her more than necessary, she didn't know. She really hoped it was the first one.
Even though it seemed like the blocks had stretched out to be miles long, and each step only an inch forward, they reached Moondancer's house. The presence of somepony who wasn't already a close acquaintance made Moondancer acutely aware that "hovel" was an unfortunately accurate description of the place. She thanked Luna that it was night. In the dark Vinyl wouldn't be able to see it properly.
Her horn lit up, and she drew the key from inside her sweater. The door clicked open, and she stood aside to let Vinyl in. The mare had made it no more than two steps inside the dark house before she suddenly stumbled and fell. By the sound of it, she wasn't the only thing that fell. Moondancer leaped through her door, her stomach fairly hanging out of her belly.
Vinyl didn't seem to be hurt. She shook herself off and stood back up. "Whew, what do you have all over the floor here?" Her own horn lit up and a bright light filled the room, revealing books and books and books.
Vinyl whistled. "You didn't tell me you lived at the library."
"Actually, I was coming back from the library—I mean, yeah, it is a lot of books, isn't it," Moondancer said. She righted the pile Vinyl had knocked over.
"Ah, I know where I've got that spell written down. Wait just a second." She vanished into her bedroom. The familiar walls were comforting around her. But they did not protect her from the sense of intrusion that her consciousness of Vinyl's presence conjured. She quickly found the notebook that had her favorite spells in it and, clutching it to her chest, trotted out of the safety of her keep.
It was stupidly simple after that. She had remembered most of the spell before she even reached the page it was written on. At least it was good to double check she laughed weakly to herself. "I'm ready," she mumbled.
Vinyl took the glasses off their perch and proffered them to Moondancer. She took them in her magic. Her horn pulsed faintly, and a few light sparks burst out of it and landed on the glasses. They danced across the surface of the shattered lens, following the cracks and sealing them up as they went. It took a few seconds.
Vinyl took them back and inspected them as well as she could in the dim light. "Neat! You've got to teach me that spell sometime. These are always a pain to get fixed when they break. Thanks." She turned and, Oh thank you sweet Celestia, headed for the door. She halted: "Oh hey, I didn't catch your name?"
"M-Moondancer."
"Moondancer, huh? Not a bad name. Tell you what, I'm in Canterlot a lot. I'm a musician, you know." She gestured at her cutie mark. "You oughta come to one of my shows. I do a lot of gigs at the Galloping Gelding. You should come sometime. I'll buy you a drink.
"Anyway, thanks Moondancer." She stepped out into the night and was gone.
Moondancer closed the door, pressing it firmly into the frame and driving the bolt home. She slumped down and let out a deep, deep breath.