The road going through Yonder’s Forest eventually led her to a mountain range. The forest sang a guilty goodbye as she stepped over the green boundaries to the rocky landscape, and Luna sang back a grateful tune for keeping her company. “It’s not your fault,” she slowly said as she patted the grassy ground.
Galvanizing Heights blew quick deep notes to greet her, introducing steep slopes and endless canyons along the only passable road across. The dull grey rocks chorused an unwelcome greeting as she stepped on them, shooing her away and hoping she’d never manage to cross. The skies darkened as she went further, preceding thunder that screamed a melancholy refrain in the distance and shafts of rainfall striking frightening notes to drown portions of the road into an endless abyss of wetness. Blizzards blew deafening verses over the higher paths, wishing passersby to succumb and drown to their cold, lifeless embrace.
Luna trudged along the path. Facing the wall of rainfall, she took a momentary step back before swallowing hard. After a few deep breaths, she walked into the storm and let the water drench her to the bone. Lightning struck from cloud to cloud, briefly showing her the path she was walking through and the sneering slabs of igneous rock defying her any form of respite.
Eventually, she passed the storm. Her mane hanging heavily against her neck and coat thoroughly soaked, she shook herself and took a moment to rest. Sitting on the road, she idly watched the countless storms waiting for her in the distance and the blizzards eagerly preparing their best performances. Her fur shivered in fear.
An ethereal head formed right next to where Luna was sitting, startling her. It mumbled an apology and continued to emerge, limb by limb and up from the ground until its form fully coalesced.
Luna blinked. The creature looked like tattered clothes hanging from an invisible string, its ethereal limbs lazily swinging about like a suspended octopus made of ectoplasm. It made high-pitched moaning and whispery whispers as it glided around Luna’s resting place. It picked up rocks and sang a few words to them, setting them back in different places and singing to them how it was their appropriate positions. When its glowing blue eyes met with Luna’s, it nodded politely and wandered to other rocks, sometimes even small stones and pebbles.
After a while, the creature dissipated into mist, letting itself be carried by an unseen breeze to the other side of the mountains.
The mountain, upon reading Luna’s mind, amusedly told her that it’d be impossible to find the creature again.
“No,” she said, “it’s hard, but not impossible.”
The mountains sang a rumble, opening a downward path back home. She could see a silhouette of Canterlot Mountain in the distance, alluring her into her motherly care and lovely pampering. It was also a mountain, Galvanizing Heights reasoned, sooner or later the creature would go there as well.
She scoffed and stood. Climbing up a few steps, she found a shrub with wiry stems and small oval leaves that smelled pungent and spicy. She bit into the bunch of thyme, chewed, then smiled courageously in the general direction of the mountaintop. “Fortune favors the brave!” she bellowed. The wind hissed in malice at her.
Luna kept her smile and continued her journey. As she traveled, the winds felt softer on her face, the snow bit less violently at her bones, and the rocks felt softer under her hooves. The blizzards cried in a miserable tone, inviting her into the dark and cold embrace of death, but she laughed and bit into another sprig of thyme. The storm bellowed a mighty screech of anguish, trying in vain to repel the stubborn mare away. The rocks grumbled in frustration and tumbled away rockfalls and avalanches, but Luna giggled and snorted, blowing away boulders and waves of snow with her mighty magic like a foal blowing into dandelions.
In one of the blizzards, she finally met with the creature again. She sang it a cheerful greeting tune.
The creature politely nodded and continued rearranging the rocks.
Luna giggled and helped it pick up a particularly heavy boulder, smiling as it gave her a questioning look. It pointed an unsure limb to a spot for the boulder to be put and Luna cheerfully obliged.
The blizzard blew a constant barrage of snow. Luna ignored it and talked amicably with the creature. Turned out the creature was a she, and her name was Occupium. It was her job to keep track of the places of the rocks and rearrange them as needed.
Luna didn’t help much; it was a little hard to understand how Occupium’s placement system worked. But, as little as she had helped, she kept her company. She talked mindlessly about her home, telling her about the sister she had just met after a thousand years, of her day-to-day life in the castle, and of the shenanigans that came with the two combined.
Occupium eventually talked, telling Luna the story of a faraway land where the mountains never seemed to change and her work was almost never needed. She also told her of Galvanizing Heights, of how she had been working there for an indefinite amount of time now. Luna nodded in sympathy, she herself not noticing how much time had passed since she first set hoof on the mountain range.
Time passed and the blizzard gave up and dissipated into light snow. Not long after that, Occupium finished her work at that area and dissipated back into her misty form, carried away by the unseen wind to her next destination.
Luna galloped and chewed a sprig of thyme, her hooves flying across the rocky mountain path. She galloped through the blizzards and storms, cutting through snow and rainfall like scimitar into silk. She ignored the song of displeasure from the denizens of the mountains and flew through the air like an arrow. She took a sharp turn that deviated from her path, but she didn’t care. She stumbled down the cliff and climbed up the canyon, following the misty path left behind by her friend.
Some time passed, neither knowing exactly how long, but Luna was panting when she saw Occupium dutifully carrying a pebble and setting it down to its designated place.
Luna sang a joyous melody as she sat down panting, spitting out the remaining thyme she had been chewing for some time. She lost count of how much she had munched through.
Occupium sang a question.
Luna laughed and replied with a weak note.
And so Luna sprawled on top of a rock, watching Occupium gracefully lifting and putting rocks and pebbles, sometimes boulders as big as houses. They talked occasionally, enjoying each other’s company and singing random songs together. Storms and rain shafts passed them by without being noticed, the wall of rainfall only serving as a catalyst of laughter as Luna stumbled about the slippery slopes, inevitably needing to use her telekinesis to keep herself on all fours.
Occupium stopped all of a sudden when she found that her job there was done. Luna sang a verse of concern. Occupium shook her head and asked Luna not to follow her.
Luna shook her head and sang in defiance. Her job would be along the path, she reasoned, and it was timeless here as far as she was concerned.
It was not the problem, Occupium sang back, her next destination would need her to cross even more dangerous paths, where the breeze felt like thunder and the drizzle felt like a tsunami. She feared that Luna’s courage would be the death of her.
“That’s silly,” Luna said. “You’re making excuses.”
For she did. She knew Luna’s fearlessness came with equal skill and prowess; it was only a matter of will. Seeing no other option, Occupium sank underground, where Luna would never be able to track her down.