//------------------------------// // Quiet, Cheerful And Pure // Story: The Olden World // by Czar_Yoshi //------------------------------// Fishy had been paying closer attention to Starlight ever since their talk by the river, where Starlight insisted she forgave her. That hadn't lessened after the visit to Starlight's old house, probably because she had seen Starlight teleport. It wasn't the kind of attention the Riverfall mares paid her, though, or the bedazzled students she saved from Gazelle, or anyone in a similar situation. She wasn't a spectacle. Unfortunately, her powers of reading the older mare ended there, and she wasn't quite sure exactly how she was being regarded. But it wasn't mean, and it wasn't for entertainment, and she decided she was completely okay with that. She was glad to have something to feel okay about. Because after her visit home, she wasn't feeling very okay. Everywhere she went, now, she saw things that triggered more memories. Her old home was no longer fragmented around her, it was intact in her mind's eye, like she was physically standing in two worlds at once. She could see her old self's reactions to things, too. The filly that existed in all the shards of memory she had found around the house was still put back together; she hadn't disappeared after Starlight filled her room with crystals and clung to them and cried. It was a Starlight who was dead, in the past, left behind and very much not her... yet the Starlight in her mind didn't quite seem to only be confined to the past. It was so strange to watch, Starlight almost didn't have room for emotions other than confusion. That filly who ran down stairs and hid in hedges, she could see her reactions to the present, changed town. She walked past a yard that had once been fenced and now was open, and could clearly see herself trotting over and sticking her head down, checking to see if the pickets had left holes she could still see into. That filly she missed, the Starlight she had only just remembered, was interacting with her present situation, not just replaying the memories she had found her in. Could there be anything of that Starlight that could still live in the present? She so wished that was who she could be again... She broke off from her friends and walked over to where the fence had been herself, deciding to take the ghost's advice and check it out. There were no picket holes. Her old self huffed, turned up her nose in disappointment, and forgot all about it, going to find something else to do. Starlight just stayed and stared. It was plain, empty ground. She wished it could produce a reaction like that from her, even one so trivial... but she stared and stared, and nothing. She folded her ears. "Starlight?" Maple called, having gotten ahead. "Are you alright?" Starlight's past self heard 'Are you coming?' instead, and snapped out of her distraction, bobbing her head for balance as she bounded to catch up. Starlight followed it, watching its legs. The run was clumsy and eager and looked unpracticed... This was a Starlight who had never trained with Valey. That, or it was one who was too excited about catching up to care. Starlight wished she had that much enthusiasm about such a simple task. She could run and do it quickly, she knew, but the emotion so obvious it showed up in her other's stride was just as out of reach as that ghost. Just because she had regained sight of it didn't mean it was still her. ...First she saw Glimmer, and now a ghost of herself. Memory Starlight was silent, but if she ever started talking, Starlight would wonder if she was going insane. "You alright?" Maple asked once she rejoined her. Starlight put her imaginary self out of her focus, but knew she was still there. "Sort of. Just thinking." Her imaginary self gave Maple a reassuring nuzzle, then pranced off to get distracted on something in the correct direction, pretending the edge of a roof's shadow was a tightrope on the ground. Maple saw her own distraction, watching the ghost. "A lot of memories of this place?" Starlight shook her head. "Mostly memories of me." After all, it wasn't Sires Hollow she was missing. It was that carefree filly wandering around ahead and finding the most pointless, yet shockingly effective, ways to entertain herself. How was Memory Starlight so good at not being bored? That was a skill Starlight had wholeheartedly forgotten and didn't even remember existed during the many long days of doing very little during airship crossings. She didn't just miss this filly, she was almost jealous. Maybe if she watched her long enough, she could get some pointers... Maple seemed satisfied by her answer, and resumed her walk. They reached the town hall, a big building that was half open-air eaves and rafters surrounding a courtyard, and half looked like a giant barn. Starlight stared up at that roof... Funny. She had never thought that much about it when she used to live here, apart from what it would be like to climb. But now that she had been to Ironridge and the Griffon Empire and other large civilizations, the town hall was a building someone obviously must have built, probably a testament of engineering... Her memory self wasn't impressed at all. The support pillars for the open, rafters-only roof were set upon cylindrical rock foundations, perfectly sized as benches for anyone willing to jump to reach them, and the Starlight she had found in her memories had hopped up on one and was walking in circles around the pillar for no reason at all. She was making herself dizzy for fun. After blowing out her horn time after countless time, dizziness was about the least-fun thing Starlight could think of, yet there was her ghost, a little wobbly as she finally climbed down from the foundation and scurried again to catch up. Why did she do that? What was she thinking? How was she smiling? If only Starlight could get her back... This filly was all in her mind. This wasn't magic; her actions were all coming from Starlight herself. What was holding Starlight back, forcing her to imagine herself reacting to things this way instead of just running out there and doing it? How could she shed that weight, and what would it take? There had to be a way. She needed there to... but the more she thought about it, the more certain she was she knew what it was. Memory Starlight was so carefree because she didn't have to care about anything. She had nothing more important to care about than doing whatever came to mind at the moment. It was okay for her to waste time doing things that were utterly pointless and irrelevant and fun, because she had no guard to keep up and nothing to concentrate on and no matters more pressing than cleaning her room and taking a bath if she got herself muddy or fell in the river. She had no problems... but how? That was impossible. Solve your biggest problem, and one of your smaller ones would become your biggest in its place. You could never be wholly without problems. ...Unless you had someone you trusted completely to solve all your problems for you, whenever and wherever they occurred, and take the ones that came out of nowhere and make them not so bad... Memory Starlight could slip and fall in the river, and it would probably put an end to her running around for the day as she went home to get warmed up and dried off, but it would be fine. She could afford to take risks, anything from walking along the bridge railings to spending her focus hunting for picket holes instead of threats that could take away her friends. And then Starlight was right back where she started. Memory Starlight didn't live a dangerous life on the road. Memory Starlight didn't tussle with royalty, magical monsters and demigods. Memory Starlight had parents. But if that was all there was to it, why didn't she only remember her past self doing the things she had already done in the past? Why was the Starlight she kept thinking about only doing things she could do too, with the world the way it was now? It felt so close to the present, so tantalizingly, heartbreakingly close... She was glad Memory Starlight was completely silent. She needed every excuse she could get not to try talking to her, a ghost, right there in the middle of the town hall. Memory Starlight probably talked to invisible friends all the time. With a start, Starlight realized Maple was talking to her. "What!? Sorry. I wasn't paying attention..." "It's okay." Maple smiled softly. "I was just asking if there was anywhere you remembered that you wanted to go for lunch. We're not on a schedule and we're here for you, and we were trying to decide whether to get food before or after going to going to see your old things." "We're going to get my old things?" Starlight blinked. Maple bit her lip. "Aren't we? I asked if that would help back in your room, remember? You mumbled and I thought you meant okay." "Oh." Starlight truthfully didn't remember. A part of her wondered how Memory Starlight would react to all her old stuff being locked up in the mayor's basement, but she needed not to concentrate on that too much. Extended time spent staring at things she wished for yet didn't have couldn't be healthy. "I'm fine getting food." Memory Starlight's excitement about the prospect of getting lunch would have depended entirely on where they were going. "Anywhere is good." "You don't have any old favorites?" Fishy asked, flopping an ear. "Not a lot of places have closed over the last few months." Starlight swallowed. "I don't know if I want an old favorite. I already have a lot to remember..." Memory Starlight had very strong opinions on the topic of favorites, and instantly went from rambling and carefree to an ardent defender of her cause. Starlight squinted. Now she cared intensely about things? But that was completely the opposite of... Maybe it made sense. She needed to think about it. What she needed much more than food was to have time with her thoughts for a while. She couldn't hear what her ghost was suggesting, anyway. "Let her think," Fishy advised. "I have a few favorites myself! Not to play favorites with an old employer, but you really need to try..." Starlight followed along, watching her memory self tug on tails and advocate sharply for another place. She didn't even know what the ghost wanted. It was probably just another thing she had forgotten and not remembered yet. She cared a lot more about her memory self than where they ate, personally. She knew exactly why this other Starlight was there and wouldn't go away, no matter how much she told herself not to care, and it was because she needed her and missed her desperately, enough so that her imagination was running away from her. She wished that imagination would paint the world with whatever colors her past self saw, instead of just seeing her own reaction to it. It wasn't that she wished she was Memory Starlight. That was a filly from a time completely gone. She could never be carefree forever, and she knew it. Never. The scars on her life would never heal. But Memory Starlight, who had gone from protesting intensely about their choice of lunch to tapping a rhythm with her hooves as she walked, wasn't so one-dimensional as being carefree forever. She was somehow balancing what mattered with doing pointless things when nothing else was important. She could both care and not care seamlessly and almost at the same time. Starlight stared longingly after her ghostly self. She couldn't un-grow and she couldn't un-change, but she wished that filly could be a part of her again... and she had no idea how to get there. No, she told herself, that wasn't true. She did know. She needed something to trust in completely, other than herself. If she had that, then slowly, step by step, maybe she could start doing things pointlessly and just for fun. That meant parents, but it meant a world she could trust, too. Starlight sighed. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to explore her old home a little more and give her memories of the place another chance.