//------------------------------//
// It's About Time 
// Story: The Olden World 
// by Czar_Yoshi 
//------------------------------//

Wallace winged away, leaving Valey and Shinespark alone in the cave. An awkward silence ensued between the two.

"...Give it to me straight, Sparky," Valey eventually said. "I really wasn't making sense with what I said about Puddles, right? About... why I let things slide with Amber?"

Shinespark's shoulders strengthened, recognizing Valey's less-combative tone. "I think I missed a few leaps of logic," she admitted. "But you're feeling like you failed her?"

"And like I failed myself. And I'd never tell her, but kind of like she failed me." Valey's ears wilted. "I've messed up before. So when I mess up again, I need my friends to call me out and set me straight. She... You know what she said?" She slumped into a sigh. "She said she never wanted to tie me down. She liked having fun with me, and liked doing fun things, and didn't want me to stop after coming to the Empire on account of her. Heh." She huffed. "I didn't fail her. I failed my own standards, and she told me it was fine. And now I'm really not enjoying myself, so I really have failed her after all. Bananas, what a mess."

"I don't get how being foalnapped by Puddles has anything to do with that," Shinespark protested, no intensity in her voice. "But you're not doing what makes you happy because you're weighed down by failing someone's expectations of doing what makes you happy?"

Valey snorted. "I was not happy in Ironridge. I was a professional bridge-burner. That was a lie."

"Oh, really." Shinespark folded her forelegs, sitting up straight. "And you running around with Amber in Riverfall was a lie too? Or that second trip where we went back to Ironridge, everyone who had been there but Amber and Willow too? The one where we properly enjoyed ourselves between taking care of business? Everything that happened before we set out east and Gerardo remembered batponies have it bad in the Empire, that was a lie too?"

"But I was bad at it," Valey whispered.

"At what? Springing back from a calamity like the one that ended Sosa?" Shinespark gritted her teeth. "I have news for you, Valey. Everyone is! You remember me that first week? I could barely speak. The war between Ironridge's districts was my foalhood. My life was consumed by Ironridge too, and I've never harbored illusions about being a pony like Amber or Slipstream without the memory of thousands of lives on my shoulders. Ironridge hurt you too, in a completely different way from me but still similar, but you got out with everything! Friends, a home, a second lease on life and no more Herman tying you to Yakyakistan! I was jealous. You had a chance at such a better life where I had failed, and I-I thought we could bond over being opposites or something, and you... aren't even taking it."

Valey raised an eyebrow. "I know you were about to say I threw it away. And... yeah. Like I said. I messed up."

"Badly enough to get rid of your friends?" Shinespark returned it with a piercing look. "Whatever was so bad about you in Ironridge didn't stop Maple and Starlight from following you and being your friends. And I know how much of a selfish, foalish, opportunistic small-minded sapphic showoff you were. I grew up with you and your antics. And you grew up with me, unless you forget how small you were when you first showed up in Sosa with a Yakyakistani scientist and a chunk of moon glass. I saw all of it. Does that stop me from caring? Do I look like I don't care now?"

"I don't get it," Valey whispered, holding her ground. "You keep saying I wasn't all that bad, and then that I really was in the same sentence. Where's the difference? What do you want? Look, I knew where I had come from all throughout those six years. I always stopped short of doing anything really terrible, just pushed everyone away and played it up like I was a supervillain. But I don't wanna push you guys away..."

Shinespark put on a grimacing smile. "Did you just say you stopped short of doing anything truly bad? Kept to a moral code anyway? Sabotaged the Defense Force for years from being competent enough to do real damage any earlier? I'm sorry, I just heard you say that. So much for living a lie and being irredeemably bad."

"Not that part!" Valey's voice rose in desperation. "No, I know that, I... I pushed everyone away to make myself at least feel like I deserved to be alone and convinced myself it was great..."

"Yes, you did." Shinespark scooted closer. "And you were wrong. Congratulations, it's not great. And that is different from what I'm talking about. That was a goal, Valey. And ever since Ironridge, you've had a new goal, and that's keeping your new friends safe, right?"

Valey nodded, ears down.

Shinespark took another step forward. "Tell me, right here and right now, what part of that requires you to be a limp doormat who's afraid of doing anything you used to enjoy."

"I don't want to push ponies away..."

"But that doesn't line up, does it?" Shinespark grinned. "Who got pushed away by what happened between you and Amber? Was it her? Did she have a falling-out with you because you were too brash and self-satisfied? Or did you just leave her behind?"

Valey's pupils shrank in a new wave of realization. "Oh bananas..."

"You pushed her away," Shinespark apologized. "Not by doing too much. By doing too little. Didn't you?" She took another step, right to the edge of Valey's personal space. "Having friends? It's too valuable to waste over little things we do that grate on each other. Imagine if I walked into my cabin one day and you had stolen my bed, because it's bigger and comfier than all the others in the ship. Annoyed, of course, but would it be a strike between us? Friends can get over that. But walking away from the table..."

"Yeah. Heh. Sounds like something I'd do." Valey's eyes glistened. "So what do you want from me? I'm listening, here. How do I do whatever you're asking? I'm not who I was in Ironridge..."

"Are you worried about our feelings?" Shinespark whispered. "Or the whole world's feelings? What has this Empire ever done for you, Valey? Nothing. It's hit you with heresies and rockets and cheating tournament fights, province after province that wants nothing to do with you and a flight across the whole country to rescue Starlight. If this is how it treats us, I hate this place too. There has to be somewhere better, somewhere in the world. And you're excellent at fighting the whole world. Forget about everything else. When someone's neutral, give them a chance. When someone's friendly, be their friend. But don't try to carry the responsibility of doing right by everyone. I've been there, and it broke me. Right now, the Griffon Empire has not done right by us, it hasn't invited us to make an effort back for it, it's battered and beaten all of us down. Listen to Wallace. We want our Valey back who can steal the world's fruit and mess up armies' paperwork. We need someone who thinks our problems are hilarious and doesn't stop at fixing them, but makes stomping them into a show. Leaders are charismatic. You can do that. We need you."

Tears started to waver in Valey's eyes. "Bananas. You're going to regret this."

"Thirty-three," Shinespark said. "That's how many Sosan stallions I helped ferry to Riverfall. That's how many marriages were crushed because my workers were devastated by their own inability to find meaningful jobs, which was not their fault but forced them to rely on relief and welfare and left them feeling like they had failed their families. They were so devastated that they walked away, cut everything off, failed the mares who loved them for real and any children they had to leave behind! And I let them! And I know each and every one of their stories, and many of them I knew before things even reached that point at all."

Valey tearfully blinked.

"You can't let that happen to yourself," Shinespark firmly declared. "You've been getting worse, and if you do nothing it won't stop here. How many months will it be until your inability to stop putting your own needs and nature and happiness aside for what you perceive we want makes you walk away and leave us behind forever? Will you last until the end of the tournament, Valey? Or maybe you'll lose for real, and that will be the final blow?" She took a deep breath, holding back a shudder by force of will. "I won't let that happen to you because I'm not willing to stand by and watch my best friend push that counter to thirty-four."

"...You sure about this." Valey wiped her eyes with the side of a leg, taking several seconds until she was satisfied they were dry. "I'm serious. You don't remember what you're asking for." As she talked, she stepped forward just as Shinespark had, pushing past the barrier of personal space until their muzzles were inches apart. Her wings fluttered slightly, and she held one hoof halfway up. "This is your last chance. Whatever happens isn't gonna be on me, it's gonna be on you."

Shinespark's cheeks lit slightly at the proximity, and her ears pinned back, muzzle tilting slightly forward. "I accept that. Please..." She closed her eyes.

A second passed. Shinespark's tail tingled in expectation of a sensation on her lips... and suddenly a hoof met her head, bowing her with a gasp of surprise as Valey locked her into a ferocious noogie. "Nyaaaaaah! You asked for it! Hahahahahahaha!" When Shinespark's mane was thoroughly ruined, before she had a chance to recover, Valey kicked into a canter, racing away down one of the cave's back tunnels, cackling arrogantly. "Catch me if you can, Sparky!"

"H-Hey!" Shinespark's cheeks went furiously crimson as she scrambled to her hooves, not bothering to fix her usually-messy mane. "Valey! Get back here!"

Valey's laughter echoed clearly from one tunnel, and Shinespark chased quickly, keeping her horn lit the moment the lighting got too dim to see without it. The laughter slowly trailed off, though, and suddenly she found herself in silence. "Valey!? Valey, where'd you go?"

A shadow swooped across the tunnel, brushing her horn with a fuzzy maneuver that expertly snuffed it out.

"Hey!" Shinespark frowned into the darkness, sparking her horn and relighting it with ease. "Vale-"

Her horn was extinguished again.

"Shhhhh," Valey's voice echoed from everywhere, warning her not to relight it. "Sparkyyyyy, gueeess what IIIIII foooound..."

Shinespark's ears fell in anticipation, only a faint hint of daylight illuminating the tunnel behind her. "Do I want to?"

"No, no, this is great." Valey's voice had a spooky warble, and suddenly a pair of hooves were guiding her down the tunnel and into a side room. "Surprise."

Shinespark lit her horn. In the room, a couple of wooden kegs formed sturdy chairs around a manaconduit spool turned on its side, one of the wheels acting as a table for drinks or playing cards. Shinespark's ears twitched. In the corner, Valey was standing, grinning stupidly. "It's your favorite!"

"That is not a real table." Shinespark scowled.

"Aww, yes it is." Valey wandered over and leaned smugly on the spool, causing it to lean slightly. "See? Look at this. What a beauty."

Shinespark reddened. "This is the architectural equivalent of a fifty-year-old hunchback with half a coat who has worked the bilge pumps for their entire life, and is also a dude."

Valey was suddenly at her side, draping a wing over Shinespark's back. "So in other words, someone's jealous?"

Shinespark made a faint strangled noise. "No. It's the least-appealing thing I've ever seen."

Valey grinned. "Oh yeah? Look, at least the table's got something on Howe, right? Come on, I know which one you'd choose."

Shinespark's eye twitched. It twitched harder, and then she giggled. "Heheh... Heeheehee..." It wasn't her usual laugh, a pitch completely foreign to her businesslike voice, and she finally looked up, still laughing.

"Bwahahahaha!" Valey keeled over in a fit of laughter of her own, taking Shinespark with her. Both of them landed on the floor, and they didn't stop. "Oh bananas," Valey managed through her exuberance, flicking away a tear. "Oh bananas. Hahaha..."

"I hate you," Shinespark replied. "And love you so much. I missed you..." Still laughing on the ground, she seized Valey in a tight hug.

"Yeah, well, it better be worth it," Valey warned. "I dunno if I've got it in me to go through switching stuff up again. I still think you have no idea what you asked for, but... nyaah." She stuck out her tongue.

Shinespark's giggles didn't subside. "Are you really back?"

"Bananas, who knows?" Valey wiped her brow. "I was a mess. Still am. Dunno if you can just flip a switch and blow all that away, even assuming you are right. Which I still don't know if I believe, by the way. Just, I've been doing a fantastic job of looking after myself my own way..."

"It's okay," Shinespark urged. "It's okay. It's okay..."

"Yeah, well, I'm saying there might be baby steps. And who knows how much trouble we'll get in if I start littering where an Everlaste guard can see it." Valey shrugged. "But honestly? Right here, right now? This doesn't feel so bad."

Shinespark took a moment to smile into Valey's coat... and then winced. "We probably should get off this cave's floor..."

"Heheh. Yeah, we don't wanna get the cave dirty." Valey winked, flipping upright and helping Shinespark with a hoof. "Whew..."

Shinespark stared back at the tunnel with a smile. "Whew indeed. I think this is officially a good day."

"Let's see how everyone else feels, first," Valey advised.

"Speaking of everyone else..." Shinespark took a step back toward the entrance, horn glowing for illumination. "Where's Wallace? Still fetching whoever he went for?"

"Sounds like it." Valey took the lead, flicking Shinespark with her tail as she passed. "I need to start wearing my hat more. But hey, wanna go wait for him?"

Shinespark followed along, and soon they were at the cave entrance. The skies were still patchy with feeble, dispersing storm clouds that failed to rain enough to obscure the view of Stormhoof, a distant spire to the east. "You see him?" Shinespark asked, craning her neck.

"Nah, but that's cool." Valey settled in on the lip of the rock, sitting on her haunches and patting the spot next to her. "We're in good condition to wait."

Shinespark settled in alongside her, and soon the two of them were touching shoulders as they watched the horizon.