//------------------------------// // Chapter 11 - Discordant Harmonies // Story: The Beatle // by CrackedInkWell //------------------------------// Apart from going to Octavia’s home to compose with Dawn and Pull a few more songs, Ocellus accepted the proposal from her friends (and even Headmare Twilight) to let her rest for a while. After all, there were assignments that she needed to do before Spring Break. The Changeling gladly appreciated this to finally be able to hang out with her friends again. Of course, any activities that involved outside of the school property would require the students some elaborate planning, disguises, hidden passageways, and being on the lookout for any fans that may ambush Ocellus if her guard is down. She had worries that maybe once the album comes out, it may make going into town near impossible. Eventually, it was agreed that Dawn and Pull should be able to come over to the school for their music sessions. Headmare Twilight agreed to lend them the music room to do their recordings as long as they do it after school hours. Of course, during that time, they would have to lock the doors as there were students who were just outside, enthusiastic to hear the next masterpiece in the making. Then a couple of weeks before Spring Break and Ocellus was packing her bags, Pull and Dawn came to the school with a wrapped present. Before they could enter into the music room, they were confused at the random noises that were leaking out. But as they opened the doors, they saw Ocellus there, along with her friends, holding strange instruments that they’ve never seen before. They saw Yona holding something that was a mix between a Prench horn and an organ. Silverstream sat on the floor with a series of clams in which every tap produced its own note. Smolder on a desk, plucking the strings of the elongated soundbox. Gallus with a fiddle that the two old ponies swear that it had at least ten strings. Sandbar was tapping on a bowl that had several dents and yet producing a tropical tone. Ocellus stood in the middle, listening carefully to each until she noticed the two stallions. “Pull! Dawn!” She greeted them. “You’re just in time!” “What are you doin’?” Dawn asked. “This looks and sounds like a school band that had gone sideways.” “What does that supposed to mean?” Pull questioned. “I don’t know.” He shrugged, “It does make me sound all distinguish like.” The Changeling cleared her throat. “To answer your question, I was thinking,” Ocellus explained, “that while the orchestra is nice in hoof, I figured of probably explore using some other instruments that aren’t traditional. So, I turned to my friends. I think some of these really have potential.” “Well, before you share,” Pull said, “we have a gift for you.” He presented her to the flat present. “Surprise! This is-” “Copy number one,” Dawn added before getting a swift hit from Pull. “Ow! What was that for?” “Spoiling the other surprise.” Ocellus took hold of the gift and tore off the wrapping paper. In her hooves was a record cover of her. A black-and-white photo of her face in which the light is only showing her left side. Above it was the words: “Here Comes The Beatle” then flipping over, next to the list of songs was something that caught her eye. Performed by: - Ocellus Songs and Lyrics by: - Dawn Lemon - Pull McCart - Forge Hayson - Ocellus Song Arrangement and Orchestration by: - Octavia Melody “Uh…” She blinked. “I think there’s been a mistake.” “What are you going on about?” Pull questioned. “This here,” she pointed, “it has my name for the credits for song and lyrics. That’s gotta be a misprint or something.” “Not really.” Dawn shrugged. “It doesn’t seem fair to leave you out. Sure, you may be the face that sings this stuff, literally, but you have a hoof in this too. I mean, you’re our muse after all. These songs are just as much yours as they are ours.” “Obviously.” Pull nodded in agreement. “It’s thanks to you we’re able to crank out these songs so quickly. Without you, we’d be lost.” “Well sure, but-” “The point is,” Dawn interrupted the student, “none of us would be here if it weren’t for you. Not just giving our old band a sort of revival, but you’ve taken us to places we didn’t think were possible. Besides, you did something with the music that we haven’t had in a while.” “What’s that?” “Fun.” Both stallions said. “I’d say it is.” Sandbar commented before turning to his friend, “So Ocellus? What are we going to do today? You said you have a surprise announcement or something.” “Well,” she smiled. “Recently, I’ve begun to develop an idea. Something to do sometime after Spring Break that I would need your guy’s help on.” “And what’s that?” Smolder asked. Ocellus smiled excitedly. “Well… I’m planning on doing a… unique sort of concert. Something that is part musical theater and part rock concert. A nonsensical play that’s based on dreams where we can make it as weird and colorful as the music is.” “I didn’t know music comes in colors,” Silverstream said, earning the eye-rolls of her friends. “How Ocellus expect friends to do that?” Yona questioned. “Think of it as an expensive game of mad-libs. First, we come up with the songs and what it’s gonna sound like, then we’ll put together a weird enough story to go along with it.” “Could be disastrous,” Pull pointed out. “I don’t know…” Dawn hummed, “Could be fun. Now if only we know where to start.” Despite all the new sounds from the student’s native instruments and the “suggestions” from Ocellus, neither songwriters nor singer could piece together the right songs. Sure, here they might start with a few lyrics and melodies here and there, but there was a disagreement as to how to go about it. Even Ocellus, who was trying as hard as she could to remember the originals, came out inkblot and lacked focus. Dawn made the fragments too crazy, while Pull made them not crazy enough. Besides, the sounds weren’t what they were looking for. The Changeling tried to recall all the stranger songs from the Beatles from Tomorrow Never Knows to Luna in the Sky with Diamonds. Despite her best efforts, at the end of the day’s sessions and some unique sounds that they recorded, the group left unsatisfied. Everyone in that music room knew that they have something, but it’s not developed fully to be used for anything. That night while Ocellus lie awake in her room. Eyes open and towards the blank ceiling. ‘There’s got to be a way to do this.’ She thought. ‘Some of the most iconic songs of all time are just at the tip of our tongues, and yet, none of us have any idea what they’re supposed to sound like. How did they do it? ‘Sure, I know for a fact that drugs were involved with the original songs at some point, but… there’s no possible way that would work now. Forget the fact that I have no idea where to get hallucinates and even if I did, I would risk getting expelled from school – but I don’t know if they would get the same hallucinations that inspired them to begin with. How do I reconstruct that musical landscape that influenced the drug culture of the sixties… without using them?’ In bed, she meditated the problem for what felt like an eternity. Now and then, fragments of lyrics would float through her head. Here, a mentioning of marmalade skies, there something about a field where nothing’s real. Then something about a Yellow Submarine, and there the whispers of a Mr. Kite. Suddenly, it hit her as if the ceiling had collapsed in on her. She sat up with a realization. Most of the songs she was trying to recall are surreal. Super weird in lyrics and soundscape. Ocellus realized that there might be one being in existence that could in one way or another piece these lost songs together. It was so simple actually. A solution that had a name. The young Changeling knew that while Discord tends to appear and disappear randomly at different times and places, there was one sure way to be able to find the Ex-Spirit of Chaos. She had heard from Professor Fluttershy that Discord comes around for tea once or twice in class. So that afternoon she went straight to the cottage in hopes that she could talk to him during their tea party. “So, let me get this sideways,” Discord said, sucking his tea through a straw into his ear. “You want my help to reconstruct a couple of songs that were meant to be written decades ago but haven’t, make them as psychedelic as possible, for the result is to inspire you and some old geezers?” Ocellus nodded her head. “Pretty much. It was either that or find some drugs. But I think the risk for the latter would be too great.” “And rightfully so,” Fluttershy commented, “concerning our school policy against it. Still, I am surprised that you needed Discord’s help.” “What can I say, Professor? I didn’t have much of a choice. But at the same time…” Ocellus said, pulling out a tape recorder, “I do want to carry out a test.” Discord raised an eyebrow. “Involving what?” “There is something that I’m really curious about. Professor Fluttershy said once that you come from another dimension entirely, right?” “So?” “Well, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, I was hoping if you could do me this one favor.” “Involving what?” Fluttershy asked. “Can you step into your home dimension for a good ten or so minutes and record the sounds that come from there. I don’t want you to talk, but just let the microphone listen to whatever goes on over there.” “Well I don’t see what this would accomplish,” Discord said, taking the tape recorder in his tail, “but as it so happens, I do need to run home really quick to fetch some sugar. After all, we’re almost out.” “And while you’re out,” Fluttershy added, “could you bring some more of those cucumber sandwiches?” Discord saluted. He then tore a hole in the fabric of reality, pressed record on the device and stepped right through. A second later he came back with a loaf made out of sugar and a tray of sandwiches. “Hey, wait a minute,” Ocellus objected, “You weren’t gone long.” “Time gets complicated back home.” He handed over the tape recorder back. “Here you go, a good half-an-hour of the natural sounds of my dimension.” “You mind if I…?” “Well I don’t see where you’re going with this,” Discord told her, sitting back down and teacup in his lion’s paw. “Although I’d probably rewind it first.” “…. Actually.” Ocellus mused, “Not a bad idea.” She pressed play on the tape recorder before pushing the rewind button. For a moment, the sounds of their backward voices were heard before something caught her hears. In the first couple of minutes, she heard the familiar soundscape that sounded something like Tomorrow Never Knows. And then, the Changeling gasped, nearly dropped the recorder when she heard from its speaker: “Number Nine…” Being repeated over and over before giving way to other alien sounds. ‘You have got to be kidding me!’ Ocellus thought, ‘Discord, probably forgotten about The Beatles too, has recorded Revolution Nine! And boy does it sound just as weird as the day I heard it.’ Then her ears perked up when she heard Discord snapping along to the absence of rhythm. “Hey,” he said, “this isn’t that bad!” “Um…” Professor Fluttershy thought for a moment of how to put her thoughts about what she was hearing the nicest way as possible. “I think it might be to… sophisticated for my tastes. Sorry.” Ocellus listened carefully to the sound and nonsense of the tape, trying to find any bits that were familiar to her. Here the madding sounds of a carnival; there the uneasiness of a clock screaming, the strange broadcasts from a radio show, laughter from someone, a chant for someone to run this way; then suddenly a mellow college of backward melodies. These were a few of what she heard as the tape was played backward. Suddenly she stopped. “Discord, I need to ask one more favor from you.” “You know,” Dawn Lemon remarked. “I have done some rather strange things when I was young. Traveled the world a bit, did some strange artwork. But this, hooves down, has got to the weirdest by far.” “I don’t see the point of us standing right here in a field full of strawberries.” Pull looked around. They were on the side of a hill where a wild strawberry patch was growing. Apart from Ocellus holding a picnic basket filled with cheese sandwiches. “So why exactly are we here again?” “Well, given how none of us has come to any agreement with the songs, I’ve decided to get someone who may give us some… inspiration.” “Should I be worried?” Dawn questioned her. “I may not know many Changelings, but coming from you, it seems a little sketchy.” “Who exactly are we to expect?” Pull asked. “All morning long, you’ve been keeping that a secret from us. And really, it’s starting to get on my nerves.” In the distance, a clocktower chimed twelve. “Welp! No mystery guest.” Dawn got up, “I don’t know about you, but I’m getting sick of waiting about.” “Me too.” Pull protested. “I like surprises as the next bloke, but what exactly are we doing in the middle of nowhere with a picnic basket full of sandwiches? You promised inspiration and we’re just wasting time!” “Uh… Pull?” Dawn began. “What!” He snapped at him. “Is it me or are those strawberries over there starting to dance.” He looked over to Pull and Ocellus, eyes wide at what they were seeing. “Oh good, it’s not just me.” What they saw coming from up the hill was something that they could barely register. At the very bottom of the hill, wild strawberries have grown several times their size, suddenly sprouting limbs and dancing about with their stems still attached. Not only that, but the rows of trees at the very bottom were shimmering like a mirage where the moving branches turned butter yellow and the leaves turned to opals. Before any of them could ask if they were hallucinating, something very large and bulky approached them, seeming to carry the insanity along with him. What Pull and Dawn saw was what they could describe as a bus. Or at least… it looked like a bus. The body of it resembled that of a large covered wagon from the cities, only that it was covered in splashes of paint in every hue and color imaginable – as well as unimaginable. Nothing was pulling it, for where the wheels would be, there were instead hundreds, perhaps thousands of legs moving it along. And there at the driver’s seat was a thin, tall creature made up of different body parts, wearing a plump purple suit, bottle green pants, white gloves, and a tall top hat. The bus stopped next to them, and they noticed that there were words on the sides that seemed to resemble every font and not at the same time. Sometimes the words camouflage well with the eye-sore of a paint job, while at other times it was clear and crisp. The words as best as any of them could determine was: Magical Mystery Tour Bus. “Hop right on!” Discord said, “If you got the cheese, we got ourselves a tour!” “Tour?” Pull blinked. “What tour?” “Can’t you read?” He pointed at the side of the bus. “I’m the destined driver into the strange, the odd, the weird and the what-am-I-looking-ats. Come aboard and pay your cheddar, the tour is about to begin!” “Thanks for doing this, Mr. Discord.” Ocellus said, flying up to him with the basket of sandwiches. He opened the lid, inspecting carefully of the contents before nodding. “All aboard!” “Is this that fella you were talking about?” Dawn asked. “Yep! And he’s going to help us tremendously with those tricky songs.” “How long’s the tour?” Pull inquired. “Unless you get on,” Discord told him, “you may never know.” Both old stallions looked at one another. With a shrugged, Dawn remarked, “You know what? I got nothing better to do.” One Magical Mystery Tour Later… “…. And that’s the end of the tour.” Discord said, pulling the bus up to Dawn’s house. Looking over his shoulder, he and Ocellus turned to the other two stallions who, at the moment, could only be described as broken. The two of them sat there, with a perplex expression fixed on their faces, complete with wide eyes, and jaws hanging loose. Discord turned to the Changeling, “Too much?” “No… At least I don’t think so,” Ocellus replied. “It was certainly… unforgettable. Something I don’t think any of us will be doing anytime soon.” “Hey,” Discord smiled, “if you wanna have a tour of my home dimension again, just ask.” “Okay, so can you-” before Ocellus could finish her request, Discord had snapped his talons, to which Pull and Dawn had popped over to the steps of the house, their expressions remained unchanged. After bidding Discord goodbye, Ocellus went to check up on the two. “So… are you both still there?” They nodded. “Do you think that what we saw might help with the songs we’re doing?” They double nodded. “And are you two going to be okay?” “Yeah…” Pull said, his voice was soft but still shocked. “So… Should we meet up tomorrow?” “As long as… he doesn’t come by,” Dawn answered in the same manner as Pull. “Alright. I guess I’ll see you two tomorrow then.” With a wave, she left. The two old stallions remain seated on the front steps. Neither of them made any movements for hours until the sun started to set. Finally, Dawn spoke up. “Hey Pull?” “Yeah?” “Remember when I told you that I used to experiment when I was younger?” “I do. Did it come close to what we just saw?” There was a long pause between them before Dawn made his answer. “Nope.”