//------------------------------// // Alienating // Story: Daily Equestria Life With Monster Girl // by Estee //------------------------------// She couldn't talk to steel. Perhaps that was a comment on her skills: something which, in her own herd, never would have seen her achieve anything more than second place. She'd been trained by what was still the gap's mistress of the forge, because everything smuggled into the gap was a risk and so in order to ensure that they would remain undiscovered into the next generation (a goal which had failed), it was necessary for the current one to learn how to create some things with the supplies on hand. That was why Cerea had been apprenticed to Trinette, because a filly who was never going to be a true knight could always serve as an armorer. The one aspect of her life where her mother had been willing to offer a silent judgment of 'close enough' while still treating it as a failure. Trinette... the smith was about two decades older than Cerea's mother: dark-haired, deeply tanned, heavily muscled (for a mare), and always trying to get over at least three minor burns. She hadn't been a harsh teacher, although Cerea had trouble applying that status to anyone when it was measured against a singular standard. (With the Sergeant now in her life, she was having equal difficulty making it stick on anypony.) But she had a tendency to let students learn through making their own mistakes, and with Cerea... the girl still didn't understand why every error hadn't seen her ejected from the forge forever. She'd learned, as best she could, and she still felt that hadn't been good enough. There might have been some general agreement on that front from the rest of the herd: it wasn't if as any of the arguments against having her enter the exchange program had been based on not wanting to potentially lose the next blacksmith... But with integration slowly under way, it had become easy to get goods from the outside. Burner cell phones with weak satellite connections had been replaced by computers with open links to new wi-fi networks, and so the herd had begun to discover the joys of direct ordering. It had been for consumer goods, initially: a flood of scarves and decorative items. By the time Cerea had headed for the airport, some larger pieces were starting to arrive. And eventually... Trinette might hold the smithy for the rest of her life, and there would undoubtedly be another apprentice: making certain centaur goods required direct experience. But given enough time... how much would be outsourced? Three generations, and would there be a smithy in the gap at all? One last practitioner, who was mostly there to serve as set dressing for human tourists who'd paid an admission fee so they could spend an hour taking pictures of quaint customs -- -- stop... Cerea took a breath, and the heat of the forge soaked deep into her lungs. The latest ingot was beginning to reach the proper level of glow in the fire: perhaps two minutes before she had to extract it. But that knowledge was something she'd had to learn from instruction and error. Trinette had said that a true smith could hear the metal speaking to them, and a filly facing atomic deafness had hoped that was some degree of exaggeration. Barding existed in a state where that statement was simple fact, leaving the girl wondering how poor her skills truly were. Next step. It wasn't something which most human blacksmiths would have seen as a necessary one, mostly because they didn't understand about the magic which lived in rituals. There was water in human forges, because there had to be. But only centaurs knew that you had to dip your fingers in up to the first knuckle and then flick the liquid in the four cardinal directions of the compass. It was a ritual of protection against having spirits of weakness enter the metal, and it had been proven to work because neither Trinette nor Cerea had ever seen a weakness spirit. Of course, it also helped to add a little salt. Spirits hated salt, which served as counterpoint to how much centaurs loved a truly pure deposit. Salt had been a casual secondary currency in the herd, and Cerea had never entered the wagering which took place before contests because a filly who usually came in second couldn't afford the losses. (Trinette had taught her that it also helped to draw lines of salt at the base of the doorway and along the ledges of any windows. It just hadn't been done that often, because the herd's natural salt supply had run out centuries ago and when it came to getting replacements... every item smuggled was a risk, and getting that much salt meant winning a lot of bets.) Back to the metal. Color, time, temperature, surface tension: that was all Cerea had to go on when she was alone in the smithy -- and when it came to the floor space allotted for the workshop, she was always alone. She took up too much room. Only one pony was interested in watching her work, he'd already gone home for the night and when he was present, he stood in the doorway. Everypony else only one pony stayed well away. And with Barding... She couldn't talk to steel. Barding, however, had questions, and so it could now be argued that the smith knew more about Cerea's world than anypony else in the palace. The smith was becoming letter-perfect on the subject of trace minerals in rare clays, could undoubtedly recite the history of the katana's invention from memory, and had already suggested a few means through which the Damascus process might potentially be refined. But he did so without understanding anything about the realities of riverbanks, samurais, or trade routes, because he saw none of those things as being important. She couldn't talk to steel, and she could only talk to Barding about steel. ...no, that was unfair. She could talk to Barding about any number of topics: it was just that every one of them had to center on metal. He could hear the steel, and so he seemed to exist in a state where any other communication had to utilize that wavelength. (She wiped off her forehead again. She was sweating too much. She hadn't been resting enough. There was the training grounds and the forge and sometimes she ate in an empty kitchen before she went to meet a tutor who now only looked through her.) It had allowed her to learn a few minor things. Cerea now knew that what she saw as the precious ores were somewhat more common in this world than they had been on hers -- which had led to Barding naming his own planet, and a near-endless hiss of translator overlap had ultimately landed on Menajeria. Gold was used for money simply because ponies didn't have all that many other non-decorative uses for it. Silver, which could channel unicorn magic, actually had more inherent value. The lack of electricity-powered technology normally would have meant bad things for copper, but that had turned out to be the pegasus conduit. Aluminum could be separated and refined, but the process for doing so was still at the stage which Barding had described as 'A pain in the tail' and so there wasn't that much of it around. She hadn't been able to make herself ask about the radioactives. In terms of metal wealth, Equestria's iron supply could be seen as early-era industrial: it was around and being used, but there was no full-scale rush to acquire more. By contrast, the minotaur nation was sitting on top of multiple huge deposits, and so served as something of a manufacturing center for heavy goods: when it came to pure machinery, anything truly large and durable had probably been imported from Mazein. Ponies had apparently invented trains, but minotaurs had taken one look at the designs and come up with the rail spike driver. Their magic was for strength: a lack of spell-based shortcuts added to the possession of hands had created a species which produced engineers in bulk, and Equestria's allies were happy to help ponies build those things for which hooves would not serve and coronas hadn't been properly trained. Barding had told her all of that. But ask him why minotaurs wore nose rings as opposed to what their favored material for such was, and... nothing. The stallion spoke to her as one smith to another (she felt he was elevating her far too much), and as far as he was concerned, there could be but one topic. The only topic he recognized, or perhaps even understood to exist. She couldn't really talk to Barding, because every word had to stay in the same narrow channel and if any syllable sloshed over the sides, the stallion started to look as if he was drowning. (He also brought in bones, because he was still under the impression that she needed a lot of them. The shelving on the left wall was starting to look like a miniature ossuary. Given that the smithy was technically underground, it also qualified as the seed for a full catacomb.) Cerea extracted the ingot with newly-made tools, carried it to the anvil. Began to hammer, and felt the strain in her arms and shoulders with every swing. There were other options, of course. For starters, there were hydraulic powerhammers, and had she understood more about water pressure, the creation of heavy-yet-flexible tubing, and how to do anything with one other than look at the picture in the scavenged book and wonder if the gap would ever see the real thing, she might have considered proposing it to somepony. As it was, the only other option was to let somepony else go through the labor. And there were portions of the armor which she could let Barding work on without issue: in particular, anything which would be set below her upper waist was mostly just a question of having him upscale. But with other sections... (Her shoulders hurt. Her arms hurt. She felt tired all the time.) ...he didn't have experience. Hers was minimal, but at least it existed. And she felt that when designing for certain kinds of anatomy, it helped to actually possess it. She was still trying to figure out exactly how tightly the final product should be fitted. Armor was meant to protect the flesh within -- but it still left the body surrounded by metal. Make the whole thing flush against the skin and anything which put a significant dent in the armor had also pushed it directly into the bone. Leave too much room and a major impact would leave the wearer rebounding inside the shell. It was possible to have a layer of padding between steel and skin, but that also trapped heat... It was a balancing act, it was the first time she'd tried to cross the narrow bridge on her own, and centaurs weren't meant for tightrope tricks. She was reaching back for her lessons, trying to adapt them against the needs of having to potentially fight ponies (and so much else), and was completely sure she was getting everything wrong. Layering. Princess Celestia had been worried about the sword. What it would do upon contact with enchanted metal, and so there had been some rather reluctant testing: something which was still in progress. When it came to devices and wonders... hitting a charged item with the sword would negate it for as long as it was in contact. If any portion penetrated the interior, it generally forced the release of all stored power, as with the lock in the wine cellar and the fountain of sparks. The sword cancelled out magic -- but not always magical effect. Cerea, who knew enough about American comics from the herd's random-draw reading material to find them generally inferior to French ones, had eventually recalled a principle she'd learned from one of the more passable efforts to reach the gap: Foglio's Hammer. Magic could conjure a hammer, and that hammer would then deliver a blow to someone's skull. The hammer could then be made to disappear, forced into another form, or soar away as a kaleidoscope of butterflies -- and none of that would negate the fact that you'd just cracked someone's skull with a hammer. If magical heat set something on fire, then the fire was fully normal. A spell which made metal stronger? If there was no charge being steadily drained, then that potentially meant the metal had simply assumed a new state: one which might then maintain. So it was possible that the standard enchantments for Guard armor (whatever those were) would hold against incidental contact with the sword -- and even then, neither the Solar Princess nor Cerea knew what might result from long-term proximity. So there had been discussions of layering. Putting the enchantments on the inside. They just had no idea of whether it would work, and so the testing continued. Testing. Corrections. Adjustments. (Her vision blurred sometimes. She felt sleep would restore that. She wasn't getting enough sleep and for what she did manage to find, the dreams were harsh.) She still hadn't completely figured out what to do about the breastplate, especially when it came to the section where nopony knew to rudely crack what would have been the obvious human jokes. Her current plan was to make those two protective shells somewhat oversized. It would make her look larger than she truly was and require some adjustments on certain swings -- but that extra space also allowed for the installation of padding. She had already been trying to deal with the problems created by having her body potentially rebounding within metal: applying that to the portions which tended to bounce anyway had potential agony echoing backwards from the future in a demand to make sure she stopped it. Additionally, as Ms. Garter had noticed, Cerea had yet to reach her full size. Being fitted for new bras was bad enough. Allowing some extra space now meant not having to hammer out a whole new breastplate every two months moons although if she found a way to give it a modular subsection, she might be able to line up some replacement pieces in advance. (She'd tried to ask Barding about ageládas, because he had been all there was. Phrasing the question to fit through the narrow channel, so that it was mostly about the kind of armor they wore, and... how it was configured. But he'd never had to protect a minotaur, didn't leave the forge, and so his interest ended there.) She hammered the ingot, over and over, because there were too few hours and too many things to do. Every extra day seemed to bring more work. More study. (She wasn't sleeping enough. It took too much time to prepare the forge if she trotted in during a period of insomnia. Her flanks had been sore for days. She told herself it would go away. Over and over.) More ponies turning away from her. She barely saw anypony, even within the palace. There had been the Solar Princess, and... there were always staff members around, if you went to the upper levels. But she hadn't been in a room with Crossing Guard since the press conference, because the training took priority. Ms. Manners had similarly been put on hold. With just about everypony else... they would see her or, more often, hear her coming: her hoofsteps might have been unique, along with being what she saw as singularly heavy. And they always had a door they needed to open, a turn they needed to make, or something four extra meters ahead that they just had to see. A week ago, it had been three meters. A week ago, there hadn't been a wall of wind around a bunk. Around a pegasus who refused to let the centaur acquire the faintest whiff of her scent during any language class. A week ago, there had been more words between them than single terms and orders to repeat without the disc. A week ago, Nightwatch had looked at her. Not through. Something had happened. Something which had to have been created by Cerea's presence, and the whole staff knew it. They created extra distance, so it wouldn't happen to them. And the one mare... She could talk to Princess Celestia about the sword. Barding only knew metal. The Sergeant specialized in combat, which occasionally led into those parts of history which related to fighting. And when it came to those he'd been bringing to the training grounds... She wondered how many of them were reporting back. It had felt as if it should have been more difficult to bring those from the other species out to spar with her, because she knew what her reputation was: namely, it was Tirek's. (She still hadn't seen a picture of him, had been unable to ask, and longed to acquire one because it would give her something to punch.) She was a source of fear, and that made having others approach for what they knew would be a combat situation seem unlikely. But Torque (casually genial and as with all of them, someone she'd only seen once) had merely been the first. She had finished her sparring session with the minotaur, he'd told her a few things about minotaur wrestling techniques and how they tended to use their horns when things became serious, and then he'd left before she could make herself ask him about the females of his species. She'd lost a lot of time apologizing for instinctively going after the nose ring: he'd assured her that it was a legitimate tactic when fighting for her life (and done so while still rubbing at the sore spots), but it had been a sparring session, some things had to be off-limits and it was just so undignified... There had been a lot of laps. And on the next day, there had been a yak. This was supposed to have been followed by a kudu, but the Sergeant had irritably told her that there was but one such family in the capital, that nation didn't even have an embassy in Canterlot, and the local patriarch had decided he wanted nothing to do with her. So there had been a day of normal training before the buffalo had shown up. Nations and embassies. She'd seen the embassies now, because somepony had left a tourist's guidebook in the barracks, right next to a labeled map of the capital -- something she couldn't read. There had barely been a chance to look at any of the photography within the guide, but it had been easy to identify the embassies: there was no other reason for that street's buildings to be displaying so many different flags. And it had occurred to Cerea that when the world knew Equestria was hosting a centaur, something every species had told itself to be afraid of... they would have a natural desire to scout. Send someone out to observe her, see what she was capable of, and... report back to the embassy. Sparring partners. Instructors. Spies. The Sergeant had to understand that. But he still brought them out to meet her, because she had to be trained. And on the level which produced so many of the nightmares, she wondered if it was because he also wanted them to directly experience that fear. The most recent session had produced the first griffon. Introductions had been made (with no talon pressing), and now the new arrival was sitting a few meters away under a fast-darkening sky, tufted tail slowly swaying. Waiting. "You're about to go up against the most dominant aspect of griffon magic," the Sergeant instructed her. "But this time, I want you to know what's coming. The goal is to resist it. Keep it from overwhelming you. Especially since we don't know what it's actually going to do." Her lower lip was briefly under her upper teeth: a bad habit, a worse look, a reaction she thought she'd gotten past -- but she'd been so tired lately, and having been told that her teacher didn't know something had put her nerves on edge. "What does it... normally do?" He took a breath. The hat didn't shift. "Griffons have a little overlap with pegasi," the old stallion told her. "Not much. They can perch on clouds and when they put their minds to it, they can manage some molding. But that's about it. You'll see a few of them with vapor houses, especially the ranchers: it lets them get a little altitude over what they're raising for dinner. The majority like to live above the ground, but these days, that means treehouses." With a small snort, "Which can still mean mansions, because Protocera gets some huge trees. Some of the bigger cities put businesses on the lower levels, but they live up top." Ranchers? She knew griffons ate meat, but she hadn't been told about the source. It wouldn't be anything sapient and when she considered how many species from her home could think here, the available choices seemed to have been considerably narrowed down -- "No weather effects, though," the Sergeant continued. "There's always been rumors about outliers who can do basic wind tricks, but I've never seen one. The core of griffon magic is just like the foundation of their society: the chain of domination." The griffon nodded. "Who you're stronger than," he said in a voice which emerged with jagged edges: something which almost seemed to contrast with the steady scent -- but she hadn't been able to link that to an emotion. "And who's stronger than you." Cerea felt that the earth pony still couldn't read all of her expressions. The little scrabble of forehooves, however, was harder to miss. "It's not as bad as you're probably thinking," the Sergeant snorted. "The ones at the top have an obligation to look out for anyone on the bottom. And they're great with kids. The real scramble is in the middle: trying to get one more link between yourself and the end. Even then, unless there's a shift in progress, most of what you'll see between them is little nods and small bows. They know where they stand with each other, just about all the time. Real problem comes when they leave the chain. Come to Equestria, and they don't know how they rank against ponies. So they instinctively start challenging, because anypony who can't stop them is on a lower link and the ones who can get the upper. We don't get a lot of tourism from Protocera because the first week is figuring out the new system through pissing off most of it, the second week is the apology tour, and then it's usually time to head back." "But there's a shortcut," the griffon declared. "We just don't use it much." "Why?" was a natural question, which also had the benefit of briefly postponing whatever was about to happen. Adjusting her hair bought a few more seconds, especially since it had now reached a length which was starting to overwhelm the pins. "For starters? Because it can backfire," the old stallion told Cerea. (The griffon nodded.) "Especially with a thinking species. Garet, tell her." The left front limb came up. Talons went on display. Cerea, who had dealt with what Papi's casual passage could do to carpets, wasn't overly impressed. "Are you a predator?" the griffon too-smoothly asked. "Or are you prey?" Cerea forced her hooves to remain still. Waited for the rest of it. "That's the core of it," their visitor almost lazily continued. "I make eye contact. And then I... give you a little reminder. Of what the cycle is, when it's predator and prey. The chain. With animals, with some monsters... it tells them just where they stand." The beak half-opened, held the position long enough to let her see the small serrations along the edge. "And they sort of -- act accordingly," Garet informed her. "Some prey just... waits for it. Rolls right over, which makes the next part that much easier..." He was trying to scare her. She'd met bullies, provokers, those in the human world for whom a single blow struck back would have seen her deported. Something which had left her helpless, and that had been the majority of what had given them joy. The griffon felt so much like what she'd seen in Japan. In France. He was utterly familiar, and so when the anger rose (something which shamed her later, she had to watch her temper, she was the guest of a nation and world), it turned him into a target. The focus of everything she wished she'd been able to do, and not all of it was earned. "And when you get something stronger," emerged as something less than words and more like a projectile, "you just remind them of that. You've told them you're something they can beat. And they act accordingly." The griffon blinked. The beak slammed shut, and talons scratched at the ground. "...yes," he eventually said, doing so at the same moment his tail froze. "Some of the time. There's other factors: the strength of my magic, force of personality. How much I can bring to bear against you. Top-link griffons can cower more than the world's forge chain says they should. But with something powerful... it can backfire. Especially since there's usually some degree of effect, even when you resist the domination. And for centaurs, we don't know what that is." The Sergeant nodded. "We know pegasi get tilted to favor instinct over thought," the old stallion partially clarified. "But that can help them in a fight. Unicorns go for speed-casting instead of more complicated workings: if the griffon's got somepony who's quick with their field, they're in trouble. Earth ponies stop thinking about little issues like inflicting long-term damage, and we get that much harder to drop because we're also not thinking about pain any more. Resisting a griffon can turn the fight against them -- but you're still not going to be yourself for a while." With a fully matter-of-fact, almost casual tone, "It's a mental effect, Recruit. It's invasive. A lot of ponies will do anything not to go through it because they don't want to find out how they'll come out on the other side. And even if you win... you won't be yourself for a while. That's why this is the last exercise of the day. No matter how it turns out, we stop after this." The pause felt deliberate. "It's also optional." She looked at him. "Optional." She hadn't been sure he knew the word. (She would have asked Nightwatch how to say it in Equestrian, but... things were bad.) "Invasive," he repeated. "Something which gets into your head. When you don't want it to. What's the physical equivalent?" She knew the answer. Nothing would have been capable of making her say it. "That's another reason griffons don't use it much," Emery Board stated. "It's one thing to try it on monsters, and they're all capable of trying it on each other: when everyone has the same weapon, that can cut down on the number of times it gets used." He snorted. "Except for a few hardcore cases, and they don't last long. But with the rest of the sapient species, if they're not bringing it out in self-defense and the other party figures out what happened, there can be criminal charges. So this is optional. You say no, you leave. And that's it." "Domination." Her voice felt hollow. He nodded. "You said... Equestria's had wars..." Again. "They've been on the other side more than anyone else." Because an entire society based around trying to be on top is eventually going to try and dominate another country. "What happens to the recruits who opt out?" Steadily, "They live with their choice. Same way he lives with volunteering, if you go through this and the reaction goes against him. That's the chance he agreed to take." The most frequent opponent. A potential source of conflict. Magic which had to have attacked hundreds of Guards. And if you couldn't deal with it, then how could you be a Guard at all? "When he's ready," Cerea said. It would have been when she was ready, but she suspected the ideal answer on that one was still 'never'. One last nod. "It's eye contact," the Sergeant said. "It doesn't have to be. The strongest can pull off a degree of it just by getting close, and blocking your own vision around an angry griffon isn't a good idea to start with. But proximity matters, and so does sapience: maximum range with something which can think is about three body lengths. They can work at a larger distance with animals. Monsters... depends on the species." I'm not a monster. She was just angry, and so much of that was misplaced. Humans could feel so much like an entire species of bullies, throwing their weight against the world around them -- and when the very environment rebelled, their only battle cry seemed to be "Stop hitting me back!" It was too easy to see griffons the same way, she was wrong, and it would take time to learn that. At that moment, she was under a darkening sky at the training grounds, she had a target, it wasn't her fault if her instinctive reaction was to pull out a few feathers, and she set her jaw while she waited for the griffon to do his worst. The griffon took off, slowly approached through the air. (She noticed it took more effort than it did for a pegasus, saw his wings flapping harder.) Came within range, and the huge eyes locked onto hers. She waited. This would be more disturbing if he had horizontal pupils. She thought about that. That was almost the worst part of looking at the statue. I'm not used to those. Are there liminals with horizontal pupils? I don't remember any... Her lower back was sore. Her legs hurt. Her buttocks needed to take the rest of the week off and based on the ache, they wanted to do it some distance away from her. I... could work some of that out by going for a gallop? No, that was stupid. She was -- tired. More tired than she wanted the Sergeant to see. She'd been tired for -- -- the griffon blinked. "Something wrong, Garet?" The Sergeant was being casual again. Cerea wasn't sure if the griffon knew to worry about that. "I know it's not working,' emerged as a protest, and did so at the same instant she decided to label his current scent as fear. "I'm giving this everything I have. She's just -- standing there." Eye contact resumed for a second, was broken again as the griffon's gaze went down. "Standing there and breathing..." "Any impulses right now, Recruit? Instincts?" She wasn't initially going to tell him she'd thought about going around the track, mostly because she felt it would probably lead to him making her do it. And then she remembered how good he sometimes seemed to be at picking out when she hadn't quite said everything. "I wanted to exercise for a second. That was it." The griffon, beak just barely cracked open and with feathers in disarray, heavily landed. "Sounds like we're done here," the earth pony decided. "Thanks for coming out, Garet. We're even." "Glad to hear it," a stunned voice announced. "I'll -- I'll just go to the shield edge and wait for somepony to let me out?" The Sergeant nodded, and the griffon turned away. It took some time before the slow walk took him fully out of sight, and the tail's tuft never managed to get out of the grass. "Same as the neurocypher," the Sergeant mused. "Wanted to see if it would happen twice. Just didn't bother telling him that. They're not getting into your head. Doesn't mean the next one won't manage it, but for now... two for two." He slowly shook his head. "Might have to line up another griffon. Garet's way up their scale, but... Okay, Recruit: that's it for today. Go wash up." She trotted towards the building, breathing slowly in an attempt to help the anger subside. Several blonde strands fell in front of her face. I need a new hairpin configuration. She could try to come up with something brand-new in the morning. She always took them out when she went to sleep. ...even if they were spies, the ones she met on the training grounds were still just that: part of her training. In terms of direct interaction, that was all they were there for. She evaluated them, they did the same thing with her, and it didn't really lead to conversation. There was one pony who had spoken to her regularly about topics which lay outside a single chosen subject. A single pegasus who had said she would fight for me and that mare sat a little further away every day. Nightwatch didn't ask about what life had been like in Japan any more. Didn't want to see sketches. Didn't do anything but provide a list of vocabulary words while that dark tail twitched and silver eyes looked through Cerea. Nightwatch wasn't her... ...she isn't. She was tired. She wasn't sleeping well. She hurt all the time, and still she pounded at the metal as sweat poured off her in the heat of the forge. There was no chance for rest because there was too much to do, all Cerea could manage was to keep pushing because she couldn't afford to stop and the only mare in the world whose fear had been fading, the only one... She never was... Cerea couldn't talk to steel. But the steel was the only thing left. If somepony had been speaking politely about it, they would have simply said that Luna was fully familiar with the issue of spontaneous magical effects being created through strong emotion. However, just about nopony spoke politely about it because when it came to that particular Princess issue, just about nopony talked about it at all. It usually took a Guard to point out when her frustration was threatening to turn some part of the palace into a skating rink, and there were a few among her defenders who were ready to fling themselves in front of spells to protect her, would give their lives for her, and still weren't up to the singular task of mentioning "It's c-c-c-cold in here..." However, there was still truth within the unvoiced observation: Luna understood the issues behind thaum leakage. Multiple frosted windows could attest that it didn't give her any advantage in solving them on the personal level, but at least she knew what was going on and why. She was moving through the Lunar Wing: something which was becoming increasingly solitary. Her sister's time was approaching, and that meant much of her staff was heading for the exits: ready to go home, make their dinners, and take some time for themselves before the blackout curtains were drawn against another day. For Luna's part, she had thirty-two minutes before Moon needed to be lowered, followed by meeting her sister in one of the dining rooms: the last meal for one, the first for the other. It was the portion of the night used for wrapping up affairs: something which had her corona steadily fieldwriting notes on a separately-carried scroll. Things she needed to discuss with Celestia, along with a few matters which her sibling could review in solitude because none of them should be allowed to ruin a meal. Staff members passed her going the other way as she moved down the halls: most silently dodged the floating inkwell, a few wished her a pleasant sleep, and she politely returned the sentiment as a wall-hung ancient tapestry came into view -- -- a rippling tapestry. She frowned, with nopony about to see. Closed the inkwell, looked at the fabric as it continued to shift in an increasing breeze. Noted the complete lack of windows in the area, then checked the local weave through pegasus sight. It took about three minutes to find the end of the trail, along with a single second to make her reaction into something more suitable for the audience. "I would generally respect the need for privacy," she stated as she entered the little library. "However, I suspect the contents of this particular reading room would also appreciate not being knocked from the shelves, and you are only a few gallops-per-hour of wind speed from potentially casting the very last working we need at this moment: another summoning spell." The little black pegasus, torso armor now awkwardly seated due to the vibrations produced by the awkward, compulsive shifting of wings, looked up from where her belly and barrel had been pressed against the floor. "Princess..." The wet silver eyes were wide, and something about the gaze felt -- helpless. "I'm sorry..." "Admittedly, this one would merely cause Twilight Sparkle to appear," Luna allowed. "Which does not sound like all that great of a horror until one considers what I have had to do in order to prevent her from reorganizing my library. I am not willing to risk having her reshelve a single palace room, because that may cause her to feel as if permission has somehow been granted. Calm yourself, Nightwatch. The wind will cease once you pay attention to its existence." Her Guard slowly tucked her wings back into a reluctant, trembling rest position. Breathed, as the alicorn slowly trotted closer, setting ink, quill, and scroll down on a nearby table before her field winked out. And then Luna lowered herself to the floor in parallel with the smaller body, less than the length of an outstretched wing away. She understood such magics. Something which was still no assistance in permanently halting all such manifestations from herself -- but it helped her to tell when one had been created. And given that the cause was always emotion... "You have been through much of late, Nightwatch," the dark mare quietly said, her own wings settling into position. "And the understatement was deliberate. I attempted to offer assistance before this, and I understand why it was refused. But you were one of the first Guards hired in this new era. We have trotted and flown together across a quartet of years. And I would hope, that given so much time, you would feel that... you are able to speak freely with me." Black fur trembled. Outstretched forelegs shook. "A lost home," Luna softly continued. "More than sufficient cause for some degree of slippage, and with a mare so skilled... the effects are more pronounced. But is there more?" There was no answer. "I offer you this for a boon," the dark alicorn told her Guard. "That you may speak without consequence until I leave this room, and the words will not follow. Nothing you voice shall be held against you. My word, Nightwatch. Do we know each other well enough that you will honor that?" The pegasus took a deep, shuddering breath. More armor shifted. "...I..." Luna waited. "...I didn't consider -- what everypony else was going to think..." The dryness turned out to be unstoppable. "Yes. Well, it is certainly well-known that the opinions of others are far more important than any thoughts one might personally have --" "-- they are when those opinions affect me!" The tail lashed. Silver eyes, whose reaction went unnoticed by their possessor, shed more moisture. "It's right there in every photograph, isn't it?" Nightwatch half-whispered, fur twisting against its own grain. "There's something which everypony only sees as a monster. And then there's me. I'm the one guarding the monster. Somepony who moves closer when something bad is happening to her. Protecting a destroyer, the thing which everypony just knows only exists to end the world..." The alicorn was silent. "And they ask themselves... what does that make me?" Trembling forelegs spread, gestured at nothing which was present. "I... I spend hours with her, I feel like I might know her better than anypony, and it doesn't matter! Nothing I know matters when nopony else will believe it! When the opinions of the herd are stronger than facts! Does it even matter what she really is, when all anypony can see is the worst which could ever exist? Hours with her, hours every night, and I have to keep telling myself that there's no monster, there never was one, but there is. There's a monster because all anypony sees is a monster and when they all see that... then that's what exists. I'm the one who's next to the monster. Who tries to explain what the world is like to it, who tries to make sure it's okay, who's guarding it! What kind of pony does that? Somepony who's just as bad? Worse, because she's betrayed her own species? Somepony who has to suffer for that choice, because she can't be part of the herd, maybe she can't even be a pony, maybe she deserves..." Luna breathed. Doing nothing more than listening, as silent a witness as the scattered books. The sleek head slowly lowered itself to the floor, with a foreleg pressing in on either side. A streamlined body shuddered, and armor continued to slip away. "I can't do this any more," Nightwatch whispered. "I can't be the one who deals with this. Not when all anypony sees is a monster. I can't. I... I need to stop. Please. Let it be somepony else. It has to be..." There was a flash of light. The pegasus automatically looked up, blinked, tried to refocus, and quickly located her Princess. The alicorn's teleport hadn't taken her very far. Just to the edge of the room, right next to the doorway. Long legs slowly began to unfold. "Do you wish to remain a Guard?" Soft. Nightwatch blinked. "Yes." "Very well." The alicorn finished getting up. "I will not deny my regrets. I had thought... that after so much time..." The dark Princess took a slow breath. Her horn ignited, fetching the notes back, and did so as the stars in her mane dimmed. "But I shall respect your decision," she finished. "After Moon is lowered, I will attend the morning meeting with Princess Celestia. At that time, I will inform her of your desire to switch to the Solar shift --" It was just barely a whisper. "-- what? "-- and I am certain she will accept. She had already considered filching you once, after all." More softly, "Which means we are unlikely to interact again in such a fashion, so in the event that our paths do not cross -- good day to you, Nightwatch. And a good life." A metal-clad left forehoof shifted. Began to move across the threshold -- "-- Princess!" Luna stopped. "Was there something else?" Six limbs scrambled to get their owner upright, and did so in open, frantic, stumbling desperation. "It... I don't understand how you -- I don't want to leave you! You're my Princess! I...!" The alicorn's eyes slowly closed. Opened again. "Ah," she said. "Yes, upon further consideration, it is possible to reframe your words. I will see what can be done." Started to trot -- Standing now, but with posture helpless, hopeless, every fur strand on edge, straining for a comprehension which would not come. "...Princess?" And the alicorn paused. "My apologies," Luna offered in the last instant before she departed for the meeting. "I could have sworn you were talking about me."