//------------------------------// // Release // Story: Proximity // by paperhearts //------------------------------// "Sparkshine's wrath, it's been hours now and they still haven't moved." Smolder turned away from the horizon and rubbed her eyes. "You were right, 'Cel, this is like nothing I've experienced before." Ocellus gave her a wan smile before turning back to her log book. After a few moments she started scribbling something in it. When a muted giggle escaped from around the pencil in her mouth, Smolder glared at her. "You're writing about me again, aren't you?" "22:13. No change in the frostwing swarm's oscillations. No change in Smolder's demeanour." "You ass!" Smolder leaned back, trying to ignore the way her girlfriend's carefree giggles nibbled at her heart. She thought about stifling a yawn as she stretched out on the grass, before deciding against the polite gesture. Then, as was the case all too often these days, she decided against being spiteful too and stifled the yawn anyway. The long grass, painted silver by the moonlight, tried to return the kindness, but Smolder resisted it with glares and growls. She shuffled about, trying to find a sharp rock or two in the spongy ground; the frustration was bubbling up inside of her, as it had been for— Smolder scratched her snout. How long had she been feeling like this, anyway? She hadn't given it too much thought before—she was a creature of action, not reflection. What happened earlier had made it worse, but it had already been there, growing, and resistant to any attempt at release. She felt like a volcano being denied an eruption. "This is the most boring field trip since the time Professor Applejack took us on a trip around actual fields." She saw Ocellus stiffen the way she had expected—or was it hoped? But the flames within her refused to obey; if anything they punished her. Smolder felt cold. Cold and wretched. But then her girlfriend smiled. It was only a small smile, unable to conceal the wound from Smolder's blow, but it offered hope and forgiveness anyway, and Smolder was surprised by how desperately she embraced the offering. "It's not a field trip," Ocellus said softly, picking up the monocular that lay discarded beside Smolder. "It's a hobby, and I've been looking forward to seeing the frostwing migration all year. Besides, I thought Professor Applejack was clever interpreting her trip literally like that." Smolder studied her girlfriend's face, before deciding that she didn't want an offer, she wanted a deal. "Sorry," she muttered. "I'm being an ass tonight." "You certainly are." Ocellus held the monocular up to her eye and busied herself with adjusting the focus. Smolder watched her as she grew increasingly frustrated with the device, before eventually placing it back on the ground. A frown caught the moonlight, and then Ocellus transformed. Suddenly she was a dragon again—a lithe, irresistible dragon—bronze eyes blinking as she acclimatised to her changed senses. "That's better," she sighed, and the rasp in her voice succeeded where Smolder's jibe had failed. Ocellus turned back to the horizon, her body twitching as extra muscles demanded her attention. "I forgot how amazing the eyes of dragons are. The, uh, fewer colours always takes some getting used to, though." Despite herself, Smolder laughed. "And dragons get called greedy." Ocellus giggled, but soon fell silent. She clutched the log book tightly in her claws as her eyes narrowed, and this time Smolder followed her gaze. Far away, nestled at the closest tip of Fairweather Vale, the bloom of the frostwings pulsed against the night. Smolder watched their glow bleed across the land, a glacier shivering under scrutiny. "Are they ever going to move?" she muttered eventually. It was more to herself than Ocellus, but that didn't stop her girlfriend from turning back with a worried look on her face. "Do you want to talk about it? You've normally exploded by now." "Don't I know it!" Smolder grimaced. It was true enough; normally she would have, but for some reason Smolder just couldn't dislodge or break down the terrible thing growing within her. She hadn't been able to spit it out when walking back to the dorms with Ocellus, nor could she shake it free when they were packing for the evening flight out to the woods. And it wasn't as though the problem was speaking to Ocellus herself; Smolder had found herself unable to talk to any of her friends about it either. It kept growing all the same though, stifling her lungs and gripping her heart. Smolder was a dragon, and so she prided herself on her ability to take things in her stride and to not panic. It was getting harder though. These days, Smolder could almost taste the panic. Ocellus studied her for a few seconds, before she then dropped down onto the grass beside her. Smolder swallowed. It had taken a long time for her to reconcile her feelings of attraction toward her girlfriend's different forms. In the end, she figured that Ocellus wouldn't be offended by her biological urges, even less so by the knowledge that Smolder thought she was a hot dragon. Though nothing compared to the part of Ocellus that never changed. "I asked if you wanted to talk, not letch." "Can't I do both?" Smolder laughed, but even to her ears it sounded hollow. She rolled onto her back and studied the star-dappled sky. Ocellus' hot breath on her face was too much of a distraction anyway. "So... Professor Rarity gave me the key today. Well, a copy of it anyway." "The key?" Ocellus didn't try to hide her confusion. Smolder didn't try to hide her irritation either, unfair though it was. "You know, the key! For the textiles and haberdashery storage room." "Okay..." Ocellus twisted onto her side, her tail twitching and thrashing in exaggerated, unpractised arcs. "It was a surprise then?" "I, uh, I dunno." Smolder felt her breath tug around that terrible hardness. "I mean, yes, obviously. I said before that I've been, er, having extra lessons after school, right? Well, they've been going really well. Professor Rarity says I've got promise and potential." Ocellus' smile briefly smothered the night sky. "That's been obvious to everyone in her class except you." "It's not about that, it's like... Rrg, damn it!" Smolder hissed, and thrashed her tail, but the words were getting stuck again. She felt a dull pain growing behind her eyes. Then Ocellus' hand was pressing against her ventral scales. "Take your time," her girlfriend said. Smolder met her gaze, looked away, and then looked back again. When she was satisfied that she had at least wrestled some control back, Smolder continued. "Basically, Professor Rarity decided that I could have access to the supplies and the workshop, so I can come and practice whenever I like." Ocellus' frown matched her own. "But?" "She said she trusts me, 'Cel. I made a joke—you know, some crap about leaving a dragon alone with lots of shiny things, and she told me that she trusts me." "Smolder, I—" "Please don't tell me that you understand, 'Cel, 'cos you don't. You really don't." Ocellus closed her mouth and nodded. Her snout wrinkled as she silently debated something. Then she lifted a hand to Smolder's face. "So help me. Why is that such a bad thing?" Smolder sighed, but it seemed nothing would make the fire light. She instead allowed Ocellus' touch to guide her; rolling onto her side, she locked her eyes on what she hoped was sanctuary. "You know, I thought about stealing some stuff from there earlier—I didn't," she quickly added, "not that that was any less annoying. Do you know that I... I enjoy it?" "Stealing?" "I wish." Smolder laughed, but it snagged the way her earlier words had. The ragged sob that instead erupted from her lips surprised her, and she could tell from Ocellus' wide eyes that she wasn't alone. She set her jaw and tried again. "I enjoy being... Nice. No, maybe it's not that, but... I enjoy this. I enjoy working hard for things, and making everyone laugh. I enjoy doing things, for others. Things I never would have thought I'd enjoy doing." Smolder felt her claws dig into Ocellus' scales, and the fact that her girlfriend didn't even so much as grunt made Smolder love her even more than she already did. For the briefest of moments, she felt that hardness within her yield. Smolder inhaled, and the cool air encouraged her further. "I enjoy—no, I love gardening," she said. "Helping stuff grow and taking care of it? I don't... I've never felt anything like that before, 'Cel. And it's the same with making dresses and clothes. I never knew dragons—I—could be like this, not really. These feelings? I don't know if I'll ever be able to deal with them, but I know I can't deal without them. She swallowed thickly as something again cracked within her. "When Professor Rarity said she trusted me, I almost... Heh, you know, I think I still might." Ocellus' face had become a mess of expressions. Smolder watched fear and pain and something else she couldn't name fight for dominance, but it was warmth that ultimately won out. A warmth that was knowing, reassuring. A warmth that promised answers. "So then cry," she whispered, as though it was the easiest thing in the world to do. And Smolder did, because suddenly it was. Her vision exploded first, shattering the sky and the grass and the greatest treasure she had ever known into a million blurry pieces. Smolder clutched Ocellus to her as the first guttural sob broke free. A second followed, and then Smolder was howling and mewling and bawling into Ocellus' shoulder, while her girlfriend held her with a strength Smolder had never known her to possess. The hardness within yielded once more, and then it finally, blissfully shattered. It shattered into words and feelings and sensations, all forcing their way from her body in ways that Smolder could not parse or use. She gasped as she finally became a volcano, erupting unintelligible concepts until one that she did understand surfaced. "I'm scared," she hissed into Ocellus' scales. "'Cell, I'm so damn scared." "It's okay." Her girlfriend's voice was soft to her ears, but still hard enough to be the anchor Smolder needed. She held onto those words as the thing inside of her continued to dissolve, pouring out in her tears. Smolder felt Ocellus' heartbeat reach out to her own, soothing it and guiding it home. "I'm scared," she gasped again. "I'm scared that I... I don't care anymore—about any of it! I don't care that I'm changing, and I don't care about what that makes me. I don't care, 'Cel, and it's terrifying me." "Remember, my love." Ocellus' voice was thick and heavy, like a blanket made of the warmest affections. "Remember, that we do this together. I'm scared almost every day, about my feelings, about who I really am. But I know that I have you, and you... You must know by now that you'll always have me." "My love..." Smolder tried the words out, shaping them between sobs and snuffles and throwing them back out into a world that was still struggling to exist. "Heh... I like that, you know... My love." As the last traces of the hardness bled out from her, Smolder felt her body itself crack and break. For the first time, she could feel her heart pushing itself free—to be open and exposed to the world, and vulnerable. It was the skin she had always wanted, since the very first time she had noticed Ocellus wearing it. And now it was hers to wear too. Nothing so immediate or neat as answers surfaced with the tears, but Smolder didn't mind that. She wondered whether she needed them more than the tears anyway. And when no more tears would come, when her body and head and heart—oh her heart!—were tired and drained and sore, Smolder found herself instead starting to laugh. She pulled her head back to gaze at the face of her love. Ocellus' eyes were warm and bronze and like home. "We're probably missing the swarm move by now, huh," Smolder said. Ocellus grinned and pulled Smolder back into an embrace. "It's okay," she replied. "I got to see something even more beautiful."