//------------------------------//
// Chapter Six: The Gig 
// Story: On the Horizon 
// by mushroompone 
//------------------------------//

I knew where the dark smear came from.

It came to me in a sudden memory, fired into my mind like a bullet as I slept. 

The last thing my flank had touched, after all, was Applejack's.

The moment played over and over in my dream-addled mind. My skin, my fur, sliding against hers as I left her little eatery in a hot cloud of emotion. The way my flesh had caught on hers, had tugged against the interior of the doorframe-- the whole thing seemed so etched into my mind that I could practically feel it again just laying still in the back of the van.

So, I guess the question was… what was Applejack hiding?

It wasn't unheard of. Ponies who have unmarketable special skills (like, perhaps, the born video game players I may have mentioned earlier) had been known to fake a more useful cutie mark. Many had their originals bleached out and over-dyed.

Unless Applejack had had some monstrous baking mishap I had merely failed to notice, her cutie mark was a lie.

I honestly couldn't remember what it was. Probably some apple-related baked good, like a pie. That would have red and brown, right?

I reached down and wiped my flank, then held it up to my face. Even by the faint, blue light of the moon, I could tell that the colors were wrong for a pastry. Maybe some other treat?

Chocolate-dipped apple.

Did that exist?

I dropped my hoof back to my side. 

There was something palpably strange about nights in the van, and I don't just mean the smell. The world beyond this little box was muffled and tinny… and yet, the traffic rolling last us was forceful enough to rattle it. It was at once a feeling of utter vulnerability and total protection.

I rolled my head to the side. Lyra was out like a light on the floor beside me. Tonight was Vinyl's night for the driver's seat, which could be rocked back into a very nearly comfortable bed.

Quite suddenly, it felt like I was back at one of those filly sleepovers again. Like there was a sort of electricity within this little metal box that passed through all of us, an excitement not easily explained. 

Before I could stop it, I found that childhood excitement bubbling over.

"Hey," I whispered. "Psst. Anypony awake?"

Vinyl snored in response.

The pony beside me, however, mumbled something and shifted against the van's floor. 

"Twi?" Lyra murmured, her voice thick with sleep. "You're still up?"

I sighed. "Can't sleep."

Lyra was still for a moment, then rolled into her stomach and stretched her forelegs out in front of her. "Why's that?" she asked, casting a golden gaze back at my relaxed form.

I grumbled something under my breath.

"Ah." Lyra nodded solemnly. "Applejack stuff."

"Maybe."

"What even happened in there?" Lyra asked. Her voice was brighter, now, as she slowly awoke. "You were gone so long."

"Well, I-- I guess--" I stopped and shrugged. "I don't know how to fix a toilet."

Lyra snorted. "You’re not serious."

I put my hooves over my eyes and moaned dramatically.

"Twilight!" Lyra scolded gleefully. She was holding back laughter, it sounded like.

“Yeah, yeah, I know!” I laughed a bit, too. "I dunno why I even offered."

Lyra laughed a while longer. I laughed with her. Vinyl snored.

Finally, Lyra’s laughter waned, and she made a little contented sound. "There's no one quite like you, Twi."

I considered the comment."Is that good?"

Lyra was quiet for a moment, likewise considering her own observation. "I mean. It can mean whatever you want it to mean."

I scoffed. "No, you meant something specific. Go on, spill it. What's wrong with me?"

"Well, for starters, you definitely overthink things," Lyra said with a giggle. She cast me a sly glance. "Seriously, though. Do you think being different is a good thing?"

"Well, there's a good different and a bad--"

"But is being different inherently a good thing or a bad thing?"

I was quiet. "I dunno."

"Right. If you like being different, then it's good. If you hate it, then it's bad." Lyra shifted position, her limbs clattering against the metal floor of the van. "If you don't know, then I guess you need to figure out if you like being different or you wanna be the same as everypony else."

"Hm."

"Personally, I like being different. Most other ponies are far too cynical for my tastes, and that includes Vinyl."

I laughed. "Oh yeah?"

"Oh yeah!" Lyra agreed. "I am gonna live my life, I am gonna do my jigsaw puzzles, I am gonna play the pop songs I wanna play, and I'm gonna keep reading eyewitness accounts of alien abductions." She enunciated each quirk on the list by snacking her front hooves together. "Vinyl be damned."

"Oh, come on. She loves that stuff."

Lyra scoffed. "She doesn't love that stuff when I'm too scared to sleep at 3 am because I think the Shorn Ape is standing at my window, I'll tell ya that much."

"Ah. Roommate stuff."

"Yeah, roommate stuff."

Silence fell between us. 

My eyes blinked lazily, battling the urge to sleep. I scrunched up my face, in an effort to reset my sleepiness, and fixed my gaze on the little patch of night sky that I could see through the back window. 

The moon was too high to enjoy properly, but I could just barely make out the faint curve of the mare in the moon's lower jaw. The sprinkling of stars below her profile made me think of dandruff.

"Hey, Lyra?"

"Yeah?"

"Ever think about how weird it is that Celestia controls the sun and the moon?"

Lyra hesitated. "I think ya lost me, Twi."

"Well, you know. Her cutie mark is just a sun. Why does she do both things?"

Lyra laughed, this time loud enough that I feared it would wake Vinyl. Of course, as I was quickly learning, no force on earth could wake Vinyl.

"What's so funny?" I asked. "That was a serious question!"

Lyra calmed her laughter. "I'm just thinking about-- about the day Celestia was born."

I tried to look over at Lyra. I could almost make out the shape of her head. "Oh?"

"I'm just picturing that lil glowing pony sliding out into the doctor's hooves--looking like a mini ray of sunshine--and her parents arguing about what to name her--"

"Okay, I get it…"

"--because she'll have to move the moon, too, dammit!"

I rolled my eyes. "Hilarious."

“So they split the difference and went with Celestia. Anything up there-- that’s her business,” Lyra said, barely keeping her laughter under control. “She can move the stars, too, she just doesn’t feel like it.”

“Shut up,” I muttered, smiling to myself.

"Who do you think even birthed Celestia?" Lyra asked, off on a new subject entirely. "You think she looked like that, like, right when she was born? Just in mini?"

I smirked. "I feel like she may have just shown up, fully formed one day."

"Oh, yeah, like she just appeared with an instruction manual and she had to, like, name herself and stuff?"

I giggled. "Step one: raise sun. Step two: lower moon. Step three: break the hearts of foals. Repeat as needed."

"Note: if you mess up, just call it a holiday,” Lyra added in the same faux-newscaster voice as me. “Everypony will play along, and probably throw you a party."

The two of us laughed in unison again, at our jokes which were likely not very funny at all. But, by virtue of telling them late at night, they were the height of comedy. The need to muffle our laughter for the sake of Vinyl’s rest only made it harder to control.

Practically drunk on our own humor, Lyra and I reached out for one another in the dark. Lyra was shushing me repeatedly, trying to put her hoof over my mouth. I was batting her hooves away, a struggle which only made the two of us laugh harder.

As the last of our laughter tore through our aching chests, Lyra and I found ourselves laying with our heads pressed together.

I looked into her eyes. Here was a pony who knew herself, unabashedly. A pony who had things under control. A pony who knew her destiny.

And yet… she was still sleeping in the back of a van with me, wasn’t she?

"Lyra?"

"Mm?"

"Why is everypony making such a big deal out of the Summer Sun Celebration?" I asked. "Just 'cause-- well, it's still, like, a month away, right? I'm already so sick of hearing about it."

Lyra snorted. "You're not serious, are you?"

I blinked and turned my head over in Lyra's direction. "What? You know something I don't?"

"Twi, it's the one thousandth Summer Sun Celebration," Lyra explained. "It's… kind of a big deal?"

I scoffed. "Wow. No shit, really?"

Lyra nodded, and the skin of her temple slid against my own. "You really didn't know?"

I sighed wistfully. "For my own sanity, I try to stay ignorant of Celestia's many wheelings and dealings. Every time I hear about her, I just think about that examination…"

Lyra considered this. "No offense, Twi, but… shouldn't you kinda be over that by now?"

"Gee. Thanks."

"No, I just mean--" Lyra sighed. "Well, you have a good life, right? You see how all of Celestia's students act… all stuffy and snotty and elitist. You wouldn't really wanna be one of them, would you?"

I looked at Lyra.

The words she had spoken had little to do with the meaning behind them. In Lyra's eyes, the true question was clear: 

If you were Celestia's student, Vinyl and I wouldn't have been your friends. Would you really trade us in for a shot at that life?

Lyra smiled nervously. "I mean, who knows-- maybe you'd be the same, but--"

"No," I said simply. "I wouldn't be the same."

Lyra closed her mouth.

I stared back out at the moon, which almost seemed to glimmer in the sky. "There's no way to know for sure how things would have been, but they wouldn't have been the same. I sure wouldn't have you guys."

Lyra smiled. "Yeah."

Another quiet settled over us, this one tinged with sadness. I felt as if, perhaps, we had stumbled into a territory that Lyra wasn't ready to explore.

I grimaced. "Ugh. I'd probably be friends with all of those antisocial unicorns… I'd rather have no friends at all, I think."

Lyra giggled. "I'm sure they're nice enough, Twi."

I scoffed. "Yeah, right! Nice enough to-- to--" I struggled to think of a real zinger, but seemed to be coming up empty.

Thankfully, Lyra could sense my trouble. "Nice enough to say 'please' when they ask you to stop talking in class?"

I laughed. "Exactly!"

Lyra giggled along with me.

I wanted to talk more. Thinking about other worlds--about other versions of myself--was something that shook me to my core. It made my heart thump against my chest, and my skin crawl.

But I was probably just overthinking it.

Lyra and I stayed awake a while, watching the night sky sparkle.

Maybe the stars weren’t the mare in the moon’s dandruff, after all. Maybe they were other versions of her, glimmering through the veil between alternate universes, whispering little nonsense things in her ear when she least expected it.

Maybe the mare in the moon had a complicated relationship with her destiny, too.

She didn’t have a cutie mark, after all.





"Rise and shine, ladies!"

The rapid, harsh, and rhythmic pounding on the van's back doors was my first memory of the morning. I shot upward and snapped open my eyes, which very nearly knocked me back down to the floor.

"We got shit to do!" Vinyl shouted. "My drum pad ain’t gonna play itself!"

Lyra moaned, tugging at her bottom lids with both hooves. "We shouldn't have stayed up late talking…"

I sighed. "Hindsight's twenty-twenty."

I rolled onto my stomach and stood. My joints were stiff after a night on the floor, and crackled in appropriate protest. 

I popped open the back door of the van. If the sunlight through the windows was bad, the light through the door was like being slapped across the face.

"Ah, look at that!" Vinyl commented, watching with voyeuristic glee as I stumbled back into the darkness of the van. "The princesses arise. You guys ready to go? We've got another shot at that cafe today."

I moaned softly. "The cafe? The same one?"

Vinyl did not respond. I opened my eyes to look at her, hoping to see some sort of sympathy. Or perhaps just see that she wasn't paying attention.

Quite the contrary, Vinyl was staring down at me with a look that I could only describe as poorly-hidden amusement. The sun shone through her long, side-swept mane, throwing little shadows over my body like dappled sunlight. She definitely had a little bit of bedhead, the hint of dark circles under her eyes… but it almost suited her. It was somehow a look she could pull off.

She smirked at me. "You're not worried about horking again, are you? I got the feeling that was a one-time deal."

"Yeah, Twi," Lyra said, reaching up to put a comforting hoof on my shoulder. "It was food poisoning, remember? Probably from all that rest-stop junk food. You'll totally be fine!"

I looked at Lyra. She was smiling a pitiful smile, though I somehow found it comforting.

“I… I guess it’ll be okay,” I said, if hesitatingly.

“Hells yeah, it will,” Vinyl agreed. “Now let’s grab our shit and get over there early, okay?”

I must have looked nervous, because Lyra wrapped her hoof all the way around both shoulders, pulling me into a reassuring side-hug.

“It’ll help!” she said. “We’ll get some food and get comfortable, okay?”

Vinyl was smiling, but she seemed uncertain. Lyra was giving me much the same look: a mix of pity and hope, or concern and love.

Deep down in my own gut was another confusing cocktail of feelings; some nervousness (what if I puked again? What if we sounded bad?), some guilt (I can’t believe I drug them out here like this, just to give up), some despair (who was I kidding, I was doomed to fail at this, too). But, somewhere in the center of that swirling cloud of anxieties was something else.

I couldn’t quite name it. It wasn’t exactly hope, because hope implies that you’re not sure how things will go. I could hardly call it confidence, either. It was more like a deep certainty. 

A call. Like this is what I was supposed to do.

Maybe not forever. But today.

“Yeah,” I said. “You’re right. Let’s do this.”

Vinyl beamed. “Alright! Grab your keyboard, Twi!”

The three of us packed up our instruments from the back of the van and began to lug them towards the cafe. The closer we got, the more my feelings intensified-- the good, the bad, and the ugly. All I could do was pray that Applejack wouldn’t be standing outside.

I did my best not to look as we passed Applejack’s diner. But I just couldn’t help it.

I was almost disappointed when I didn’t see her.

“Hey, Cheese!” Vinyl greeted the owner jovially, breaking me out of my cloud. “Sorry about the short notice, my guy.”

Standing in the doorway was a tall, slim stallion in a grey turtleneck. His dark mane was pulled back into a tight little bun at the back of his head. He sort of… I dunno, scowled at us. I wanna say I remember him, but I was in a bit of a haze the first time I’d met him. If I’d met him.

From the way he looked at me, I guessed we’d never met. 

“It’s no problem,” Cheese said. His gaze rolled over our whole group quite lazily. “My slam poet pulled out at the last second, anyway.”

Vinyl’s face fell. “Aw, I’m sorry to hear that.”

Cheese shrugged. “Meh. You’re early, y'know.”

“We were hoping we could get some breakfast before we play,” Lyra explained, smiling brightly. “Would that be alright?”

Cheese took his sweet time turning his head over to Lyra. “Well, are you gonna pay for it?”

“Uh…” Lyra seemed confused by the question. “Yeah?”

Cheese sighed. “Shouldn’t you be playing on an empty stomach?” he asked, pointing to me.

I pointed to myself. “What, me?”

“Yeah,” Cheese said. “You’re not gonna yak again, are you?”

I blushed fiercely. “N-no…”

Cheese nodded. “Well, if you do, just don’t do it in my cafe. Deal?”

I swallowed. “Uh, d-deal.”

He sort of stared me down for a second. Not menacingly. “Not inspiring a lot of confidence.”

Vinyl chuckled awkwardly. “That’s just how Twilight is! Sh-she’s good, Mr. Sandwich, I swear.”

Cheese looked over at Vinyl. “We’re the same age.”

Vinyl’s eyes went wide. “Really?!”

“How about some breakfast?” Lyra broke in, faking cheerfulness in the form of volume. “Boy, I sure could go for some coffee and a scone right now!”

Lyra began pushing me into the cafe, right past its owner. I would have protested, would have pushed back against Lyra’s shoves, but my knees buckled as soon as we crossed the threshold. It may as well have smelled like vomit in here, for the memories it brought back.

Vinyl trotted in step behind Lyra, and the three of us immediately piled into a table by the door.

This is good, I thought as Lyra forced me down into the iron-framed chair. I’m near the door, I can look out the window. No way I’ll feel sick sitting here.

Even as I thought it, I only found myself staring across the street into Applejack’s bakery.

“Yo, Twi,” Vinyl said, waving a hoof in front of my face. “Focus up. Let’s order some food, huh?”

I blinked rapidly. “Oh! Right, right…”

It took everything I had to refocus on the little menu in front of me.

The inside of this cafe was like the opposite of Applejack’s diner. Not in a bad way, of course! It was just… well, in Applejack’s diner, it was like every sound was worth hearing. Like the everyday cacophony was music in itself, reverberating through the whole space. Ponies were laughing and chatting and meeting and reuniting… it was like its own little community.

This place was decidedly not that. It was designed to muffle, it seems; leaving little but the low murmur of conversation and the occasional clinking of spoons against mugs. It was a place where lots of ponies could go to be alone at the same time.

Again. That wasn’t a bad thing. I don’t mean to make it sound bad.

It was just… different.

And, at the time, I kind of wanted to disappear into the cacophony of Applejack’s diner. 

Or… would I just fade into the murmur here?

I can’t even keep track of my own musings.

I looked up at the counter. Clearly nothing on this menu was actually going to make it into my brain, and so I might as well just survey the case until I saw something that looked good.

Cheese Sandwich, the place’s proprietor was standing behind the counter. He looked awfully gloomy. His sweater was abnormally large, I noticed-- draping all the way over his rump and hanging loosely about his barrel.

Only sad stallions wear sweaters that big.

He was chattering softly on the phone, his brows furrowed. Whoever he was talking to, they sure were making him anxious. He was looking all around the cafe as he spoke like a nervous bird. I tried to follow his gaze, but couldn’t figure out what he was looking at.

“What’s up with that guy?” I asked softly.

Vinyl looked up from her menu. “Who? Cheese?”

Lyra looked over her shoulder, taking in the image of the stallion moping against the front counter. She then turned back to look at us. “Yeah… he seems really sad, don’t you think?”

Vinyl glanced back at him. “I dunno. I thought he was just… poet-y.”

“I… guess,” I agreed hesitantly.

I looked around the room. It wasn't just the sound that was muted, now that I noticed-- it was everything. The colors, the smells, and I'd bet even the tastes we're all just… dull. Like the life and joy had been sucked out of them. Or, perhaps, that life and joy had not yet been gifted.

The front windows had these big wood shutters on them that were filtering out the brightest rays of sunlight, and the kitchen was totally closed off by a heavy wood door. I supposed that this place had once been a home, and had been converted to a cafe. Much like Applejack's diner.

"Doesn't it feel really dark in here?" I asked. "Or is that just me?"

"Twi:" Vinyl leaned over to put a hoof on me. "Focus up, champ. What do you want for breakfast?"

I barely managed to tear my gaze away from the shuttered windows. "Uh…"

"How about a muffin?" Lyra suggested. "Chocolate chip?"

"Um…" I tried to read the menu again, but the letters all swirled together into a mish-mash of nonsensical shapes. "S-sure. Sounds good."

"Great." Vinyl did not think it was great. She closed her menu and set it down in front of her, turning her attention to Cheese.

He was still talking on the phone in hushed, but urgent tones. As if trying to disguise his conversation from his patrons.

“Six hundred bits?” he asked incredulously. “Can I do installments?”

I swiveled my ear towards him curiously.

The voice on the other end of the phone murmured something.

“No, Philip, I need this now,” Cheese insisted. “I’ve got a health inspector coming, and my usual guy-- uh-huh. Uh-huh.”

Health inspector?

I looked around the room again. I don’t know much about the restaurant business, but it sure seemed like this place was in danger of receiving a subpar rating. Who knew what he was hiding in the back?

My eyes wandered up to the ceiling. It looked as if nearly half the bulbs were out, and… was that water damage?

I shifted in my chair, trying to get a better look at the dark stain on the ceiling, and my chair rocked over to one side significantly.

Yikes. Now that I was… well. Lucid. This place was kind of a dump.

“Alright. Thanks, Phil.” Cheese hung up, looking defeated. He surveyed the room and quickly spotted our closed menus, then trotted over in our direction.

Vinyl began to rattle off orders for the group of us, and I watched Cheese’s face. He had that specific sort of stress that only sleep deprivation and hopelessness can give you. 

I scooted my chair to one side, and it teetered over again.

"Sorry about the chair," Cheese said, having noticed my teetering. "Let me swap it out for you, okay?"

"Oh, no!" I insisted. I'm not sure why; I would've liked a better chair. "It's alright. I don't mind."

Cheese sighed wistfully. "Nopony tells you how hard it is to run a cafe. Just being able to cook isn't good enough, y'know."

He seemed to be waiting for a reaction, so I chuckled awkwardly.

Cheese didn't seem satisfied, though he gave up trying to get something out of me. "I'll be back with your breakfast."

He trotted away.

"Damn," Vinyl commented. "That guy is not good with customers."

"Vinyl!" Lyra scolded.

"What?" Vinyl shrugged. "It's true. He's just so awkward and… gloomy."

I rocked my chair back and forth a little more. "Y'know, this isn't that hard to fix. I bet if you taped a cork to the bottom of the leg it'd be fine. He must really not have the time…"

Lyra looked at me, a sparkle in her eyes. "Oh, my gosh. Twilight, you should totally offer to help him fix things up in here!"

Vinyl scoffed. "Something tells me he won't take that as a compliment."

"Oh, pft." Lyra waved her hoof dismissively. "It sounds like he really needs the support, don't you think?"

The question was directed at me, but I was slow on the uptake. "I mean… I think he was just on the phone with a handypony. I’m sure he’d rather pay a professional."

“You were listening to his phone call?” Vinyl asked, smiling almost with pride. “Damn. Sneaky.”

"Don't you think he'd like the support of a unicorn, who is absolutely desperate for some odd jobs?" Lyra said, nudging me with her elbow. "Huh? Crusaders, right?"

I grumbled a little and sunk down lower in my chair.

Vinyl cleared her throat. "I kinda thought the whole 'Crusaders' thing was gonna be done, like… via classifieds. Not just randomly doing shit that we think ponies might like."

I pointed at Vinyl in support.

"But how are we supposed to be impulsive if we're not following whims?" Lyra argued. “Right?”

I leaned over the table. “Yeah but how am I supposed to offer my help without sounding like a total dick?”

Vinyl laughed. “I don’t think that’s possible.”

“We could just talk really loud about Twilight’s handypony skills,” Lyra suggested. “See if Cheese asks.”

“Right,” I said with a laugh. “‘Cause I totally have those.”

“Isn’t that the point of the Crusaders?” Lyra asked. “To find your skills by trying stuff out? Maybe you do have handypony skills, and you’ve just never had the opportunity to--”

"Breakfast," Cheese announced, having appeared behind me holding a large black platter.

What was it with waitstaff and sneaking up behind me?

We all clammed up instantly, which I’m sure wasn’t suspicious at all.

Cheese set a muffin down in front of me, an egg sandwich in front of Vinyl, and a yogurt parfait for Lyra. As the last dish hit the table, the lightbulb just above our table fizzled out.

"Oh, you can't be serious…" Cheese muttered, looking up at the now-dead bulb. "I don't even have a step-stool."

Lyra looked at me.

I tried to shake my head, very slowly, but this apparently meant nothing to my friend.

Vinyl was just staring up at the ceiling with Cheese.

"Twilight can help!" Lyra blurted suddenly.

Cheese slowly turned to look at me, his eyebrows raised, silently asking for clarification.

My mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water.

"She's a unicorn," Vinyl explained hastily. "She can replace all the bulbs and shit without a step-stool."

"And she can help with other stuff, too!" Lyra added brightly.

Cheese cocked his head. "Oh?"

"I-I…" I stuttered. "I, uh… s-sure, I can change the bulbs."

"And fix the chair!" Lyra prompted. "Right, Twi?"

Cheese stared at me silently. For such a lanky, awkward dude, he had a very unnerving gaze. The guy could've made a decent cop, I thought. Or… I dunno, maybe an actor. I'm not really sure what that's good for, honestly.

"You really think you can fix it up in here?" Cheese asked.

I hesitated, then shrugged. "If you need an extra hoof around for a day or two… I don't mind."

I thought for a moment that Cheese would crack a smile, but the stallion was unbreakable. "I'm not much of a decorator. It'd be nice to have the help."

I sat up a little straight. "Really?"

"Sure," Cheese agreed with a little shrug. "I can't pay you, though."

"That's okay!" I smiled in relief. "Just… happy to make friends and help out."

Cheese nodded. As he did, he looked over the three of us. There was an odd look in his eyes, as if he was looking for somepony that was inexplicably missing from our group. He stared at the empty chair for a while, blinking slowly.

At long last, he came out of his consideration. "Eat up. You guys are on in a few minutes."

He trotted into the back, closing the door behind him.

"Lyra!" Vinyl scolded.

"What?" Lyra asked innocently, already giggling lightly. "She wasn't gonna do it herself."

Vinyl laughed, too. "Yeah, 'cause she's not fuckin' stupid."

Lyra rolled her eyes. "Well, it all worked out, didn't it?"

"I've never changed a lightbulb before," I admitted, then quickly clapped a hoof over my mouth.

Vinyl peered at me over her shades, and Lyra appeared to be holding back laughter.

"Seriously, Twi: where the hell did you grow up?" Vinyl asked. "Canterlot Palace?"

"Oh, what, and you've fixed a toilet before?" I asked.

Vinyl snorted. "No, but I've changed a lightbulb, dweeb."

Lyra giggled along.

I looked down at my hooves. "Shut up, guys…"

"Aw, we love you, Twi," Lyra said, rubbing my shoulder with one hoof. "Always full of surprises."

Vinyl smiled, but had nothing to add.

I took a bite of my muffin, praying to myself that Cheese’s kitchen was up to code.





Back up on the little stage, things felt different.

I don't just mean that the cafe felt different than when we'd been eating, even though it did. 

It was different than it was on our first attempt. I couldn't quite put into words what was different… but things felt more familiar now. Like I was playing for friends and family instead of strangers.

It also felt like maybe it wouldn't be the end of the world if I fucked up, because I had a plan B. If I failed at music, I could still be a handypony, right? And if I failed at that, I could be something else.

Never underestimate the power of a plan B.

Lyra was striking chords on her guitar, just for the heck of it, while Vinyl and I set up. She started to sing. Softly, but with great emotion.

I quickly turned to face my keyboard and began to play along with her. It was not a song I'd heard before, and yet it sounded so sweet and comforting. Uplifting, I suppose you'd say.

Keeping up with the changing chords was hard, though. Like an improvisation where only Lyra was in on the punchline. Vinyl joined, too; clumsily at first, but gaining confidence.

Oh my. Um, stop please, everyone, um-- Excuse me? I mean no offense, but your rhythm is just a teeny-tiny bit off.

I stopped playing and looked around for the voice… so soft it was hardly there. 

Nopony had spoken.

Strange as it may seem, I was getting used to these voices in my head.

Vinyl started to sing. She hardly ever sang.

While we were playing, I remember thinking it was the most beautiful song I'd ever heard. Later, I would find that this wasn't even remotely true. But, I guess that's just what happens when you improvise.