I didn't really know what to do. The rain wouldn't letup, I'd lost the umbrella hat, and I couldn't tell if what was streaming down my face was more tears than rainwater.
All my instincts told me to crawl away somewhere and hide, to let it all out somewhere that people couldn't see. I wanted to. But the rational part of my brain said that I'd be better off with a shoulder to cry on. Someone who was supportive, someone who understood.
I didn't really know anyone who fit that description, so I went back to the castle to try and find Starlight.
At least she'd be able to try and make sense of it.
"Starlight?" I called out as I entered the castle. No answer, my voice echoing hollowly in the halls. The magical lights were still on, though if they were off I wouldn't have any idea on how to turn them off.
I looked in the kitchen. She wasn't there, nor was her stack of papers. I looked in some of her rooms, the ones that were open at least. Not in the bathroom, not in the private study, not in her bedroom, not in any number of the spare rooms of stuff. I knocked on each one, then waited a few seconds for an answer. If I didn't hear anything, and I didn't hear anything at any of the doors, I tried the door and went in. I even though to check the library, and even though it was almost spotless compared to how it'd been when I'd last seen it, Starlight was nowhere to be found.
I called out again as I roamed through the castle. "Starlight? Are you there?"
I wandered, and wandered, until an idea struck me. What about that odd room I'd found in my wing of the castle? With the blankets, and the pillow fort? With nothing else, I made my way along to that room, knocked, and waited. Then I knocked again, just in case. Hearing no answer, I opened the door and went in.
Someone was in here, alright. A faint flickering light from inside the pillow fort cast long shadows across the room, and I could hear the staticky hiss of an old style radio. I could only just hear the a soft ballad being played on the station.
"Starlight?" I said softly.
Starlight poked her head up from the pillow fort. "Hi Ink Blot. I thought you were going to the Senior's Hall?"
"I did. I remembered something. It was... difficult."
"Oh," said Starlight. "Do you need to talk?"
"Yes."
She smiled, though it turned into more of a grimace, and waved me over. I crawled into the pillow fort, doing my best not to knock over anything load-bearing. The flickering light was from this battered old lantern, made of tin with glass windows for the light to escape from, as well as a patterning of punched holes. The holes were both decorative and functional, allowing more light to escape while being aesthetically pleasing. Inside of the lantern was a fat candle that burned brightly. Beside it, an antique radio receiver crackled as it played a soft guitar ballad.
"This is cozy." I commented.
"Trixie and I made this a few months ago, when we had a sleepover. We haven't really done anything non-work related together since then." Starlight smiled sadly.
"She's the guidance counselor, right? At the school?" I verified.
"Yeah. She was the first friend I made without Twilight's help. Actually, Twilight didn't want me to be friends with her at all. Wouldn't you know, buying a cursed amulet and conducting a hostile takeover of Ponyville as revenge for being humiliated after her magic show was revealed as mostly optical illusions and stage trickery? Doesn't really put you in Twilight's good graces." Starlight reminisced.
I scoffed. "Yet she forgave you for going back in time and messing with the future."
"I was afraid. Angry. Wronged. I wanted revenge," Starlight sighed. "For so long I'd bottled everything up I was trying to release it the only way I knew how. And that was by making other people miserable, like how I'd been. My best friend - my only friend - Sunburst, got accepted into Celestia's School of Magic, and I got left all alone. My parents weren't home very much, because their jobs were very demanding. We weren't really close. Sometimes it felt like they couldn't even remember my birthday. My birthday! The most important day in my life, and they... forgot about it. Sunburst never forgot. Until Sunburst was gone."
"And then you took over that town, and then you tried to erase Twilight's friendships."
"Yeah. I regret doing that to them. The town. Twilight. Fluttershy. Rainbow Dash. Rarity. Pinkie Pie. Applejack. I don't know if I can ever forgive myself. I know they have, but I don't know how long I'll carry this with me."
I smiled knowingly. "I know the feeling. I don't know why."
"Look at me offloading all this emotional baggage on you. This was supposed to be your therapy session." Starlight chastised herself.
"It's alright. I have good ears, you won't wear them out." I chuckled, but the levity soon ran out.
"You said you remembered something. What was it?" Starlight asked, getting to business.
"It was about my grandpa. A song he used to sing. They sang it at the Senior's Hall, the second last set before intermission. He would sing it for me before bed, he'd sung it for my mother too. The last time he ever sang it was at her funeral."
As the weight of what I said sunk in, I could feel tears welling up again. I clenched my eyes tight to try and stop them, but that only made it worse. I could almost see him, I could hear his voice softly singing the words. Ae fond kiss and then we sever...
"After mom died, I felt so empty inside," I found myself saying. "All I wanted to do was run away, as far as I could, go somewhere I didn't have to think about it. He didn't want me to go, but I did anyway."
"Run away? Where did you run?" Starlight asked.
"I don't know... exactly. It was the same thing his uncle, my great-great uncle, had done. The same thing that had killed him, left his family with only a stupid piece of metal to remember him by. I remember that it was something I used to respect, but after doing it myself I grew to hate it." I shook my head, which was starting to get all fuzzy inside. Like my mouth was full of cotton, but my whole head. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply, not thinking, not moving, only breathing, only feeling. It relaxed me, somehow, and I felt a deep sense of relief.
"Are you alright?"
I opened my eyes and looked at Starlight. "I think so. It's like my head's gotten lighter, somehow. Can you... check my memory? The part under the curse?"
"Oh, sure." Starlight nodded. Her horn began to glow, which she pointed at my forehead. I felt a slight cooling sensation at the back of my mind. Breathing deeply, I tried to recapture that sense of ease I'd felt just earlier.
"Don't go too deep, just look at the surface." I cautioned her. I didn't want her to get zapped again.
Eventually, the glowing ceased.
"It's hard to say. You're making new memories just fine, but a big chunk of what I like to call the "memory pool" is too murky to look at. It's a little on the nose, but it's like it's been covered in-"
"Ink. Thick black ink. Like a classified document." I interjected.
"Exactly," Starlight said. "But I still can make out some vague shapes and concepts. You were close to your grandparents?"
"Yeah. Until my mom died. I don't know how long it's been since I saw them. Could be years. Feels like years."
"Maybe you should try to find them, when you remember them enough." Starlight suggested.
"Maybe," I sighed. "Maybe."
Outside, the rain was no closer to letting up than it had been earlier. A stray thunderbolt made me jump, but being inside the pillow fort made me feel like a kid again. That childlike sense of safety from all the blankets and pillows was something special that I wanted to hold onto. Even though it was wet and cold and miserable outside, it felt like everything was gonna be alright.
After a while, I felt that the music was too quiet, so I reached out with my hoof to the radio.
"Do you want the music louder?" Starlight asked.
"Check this out." I replied, bringing my other hoof to the mechanism and extending the claws. With care, I closed the claws on the volume dial, and turned it up.
"That's... kind of cool, actually. But couldn't you just use magic?"
I shook my head in disappointment. "I don't know how to do magic. From what little I've seen almost all unicorns can do it latently. Of course I've only been up and at 'em for, I don't know, less than a week? So I'm not entirely sure what's normal."
"Almost all unicorns have at least some magic, but like any skill it needs time and effort to develop. Newborn foals up to three years may exhibit magical talent and even be shockingly proficient, but will often have little self-control." Starlight began.
"I see. So they're like little magic bombs that could go off at any moment?" I questioned.
Starlight grimaced. "Sorta? I'm not very good with young children, so I avoid the ones who aren't old enough to go to school. Mostly because as they age they aren't as impulsive with their magic, so I don't have to worry about random magic outbursts. A lot of it has to do with emotions, so somepony who's excited or angry might involuntarily do something like produce sparks. Past that it becomes a lot of practice and self study, though promising young unicorns like my friend Sunburst get headhunted by the School for Gifted Unicorns. Others who aren't so lucky need to pass an entrance exam, like Twilight did. It's like any life skill."
"That makes sense," I commented. "I suppose it becomes second nature after a while, and you don't really have to think about it."
"Exactly. There are so many things I just don't know how to do without magic. I've only been entirely without magic twice in my life, and I only barely got out of those by the skin of my teeth with a little quick thinking and a lot of luck." she smiled wryly.
"Well, if that's the case, I've just got to wonder one thing." I replied.
"What's that?"
"How come I don't know how to do magic? Like, I don't even know where to start with it. At all."
Starlight was silent for a moment. As the silence grew, so did the furrow in her brow. "Like, at all?" she asked.
"At all." I confirmed.
"Hmm," said Starlight. "I don't know. I've got some books on magic theory in the library if you want to take a look at them. And there's a few pointers I could give you once you've gotten started."
I nodded my agreement, and a few moments later we relocated to the library.
As I sat down along the walls, Starlight's magic was hard at work transforming the area of study into one of teaching. The tables were all shuffled together and covered with a very large blanket, creating a makeshift platform in the centre of the room. A series of chairs were brought out and arrayed in some strange pattern. Candles came out too, a vast assortment was placed in holders and candelabras and the grand crystal chandelier that cast most of the light around the library. Tall spindly ones, stout fat ones, scented ones, even little tea lights. Then, a strange collection of toys and objects were placed around the room.
Starlight trotted over to me, bringing a spare table as well as a host of reading material. She stacked the books neatly on the table, and pulled up a chair of her own.
I took a peak at the book at the top of the stack. It had a rather childish drawing of a unicorn horn and a bunch of... stuff coming off of it. The rendition was sort of dubious at best. "Baby's First Spell? You think I'm a baby?" I asked.
"Uh, no? Let's change the subject." Starlight cringed. The offending book sailed off into a box on the far side of the room like it'd been given a good punt.
"Okay."
She cleared her throat and with a flick of her horn a collection of books flew up and opened up before her. "Let's see... I'm going by touch here, so you'll have to bear with me. I'm not the best at teaching, mostly guiding and managing. Thank the stars I'm in charge of a school for friendship and not teaching math or something. Ah, here we go!" Starlight had found the book she was looking for and floated it over in front of me.
"Basic Magic Theory: Volume One; Focus." I read out. The image on the cover vaguely resembled a green frog.
"Yes, yes. Focus. The first few chapters are a little dry but you can read those on your own time. What we care about are the exercises in Section Six," she said, nodding to herself as she brought over a few stones, each one painted in distinct geometric patterns but overall fairly uniform in shape. "These stones are designed to be sensitive to even the weakest magical pulses. Each one reacts slightly differently, but that has more relevance to Volume Ten than Volume One."
"What's Volume Ten?" I asked.
"Accuracy."
"What are the other volumes?"
"Not important right now! Because there's seventeen of them. Followed by fifteen volumes of Advanced Magic Theory, and two volumes of Master Magic Theory. All of them are larger and thicker than this one." Starlight explained.
"Why are there only two volumes on Master Magic Theory?" I asked.
"Because the publisher went out of business," Starlight said before smacking the table with her hoof. "Focus!"
"Sorry." I replied.
Starlight rubbed her eyes. "By the Sun and moon this is going to take forever... Anyway, the goal for this exercise is for you to successfully knock over this tower of stones exclusively by magical means. It doesn't matter how it is knocked over as long as your magic is directly responsible for the chain of events which caused it to be knocked over."
"The book really covers that?" I asked.
"If you interrupt with one more question that is about the book and not the lesson I'm trying to give you, you will not receive the rest of the lesson!" she snapped.
"Sorry." I replied again.
Starlight shook her head disapprovingly, but continued regardless. The stones were stacked a few metres in front of me on the floor. She drew a chalk outline with a one metre radius around the stones and then pointed the chalk at me.
"You may stand anywhere in the room, so long as no part of you enters the circle. This is to ensure you do not knock the stack over without magic, whether it's accidentally or intentionally. No exceptions."
"Understood." I nodded.
"Now, there is a prescribed technique, but the book does explicitly note that the technique given may not work perfectly for all students, and some self experimentation may be required on the part of the student. Begin by placing all of your hooves equidistant from one another so that you have a solid, well balanced stance."
I complied, feeling slight strain on my muscles as I adopted the stance.
"Begin to regulate your breathing. Do this by breathing in for four counts and breathing out for four counts, counting at half the speed of a steady walk. This will steady your heartbeat and calm your nerves."
In, two three four. Out, two three four. Repeat ad nauseum.
"Clear your mind, letting all worldly concerns slide away. Forget everything that is not relevant to this very moment. Think of nothing but your stance, your breathing, and your focus."
Breathe. Focus.
"Reach out with your mind, feeling the world around you. Bring your focus onto the stack of stones, and open yourself to the energy of the world."
..?
"Feeling the energy, coax it into your guidance. Using this energy, enact your will on the stones, push the stack over."
Something was off. I didn't know what she meant by the "energy of the world". Maybe I'd missed the ticket? Maybe there was something she'd forgotten to mention?
My confusion must have been obvious, because Starlight quickly urged me, "Focus, Ink Blot! Focus is the key!"
So I tried to focus. I frowned, clenched my teeth, flexed my muscles, and absolutely bored into the stack of rocks with my eyes. Something was going to happen; something had to happen.
But nothing was happening. It wasn't working, no matter how hard I stared at it, no matter how I gritted my teeth, no matter how tightly I shut my eyes, no matter how hard I tried to clench my muscles, nothing happened. Nothing! Not even the slightest indication or feeling or hair sticking up on the back of my neck! Why. Wasn't. It. Working?
I wanted to scream bloody murder. I wanted to run over and kick the stack of rocks.
Stupid rocks. Stupid magic. Why the hell was it so hard? The way Starlight talked about it, magic was the easiest thing to do in the world.
...Dang it.
From what little I'd seen and heard of Starlight, she was a magical prodigy. She'd probably managed to teach herself to do advanced magic, and the way she used even the most basic magic was effortless. Why, she'd moved around an entire room's worth of furniture, and could pick out books from the shelves without even looking.
"Ink Blot, if you don't focus you-" she began.
"It's not going to work," I cut her off. "At least not like this. You're trying to teach me the way you know magic, while assuming I understand what seem to you like basic concepts. But I've never encountered them before, unless this curse has covered that up too. What even is the "energy of the world"? What does that mean?"
Starlight blinked. Then blinked again. She was at a loss for words. "Oh," she finally said. "I didn't mention that, did I?"
"No, you didn't." I shook my head.
"Okay, so basically the "energy of the world" is an abstract concept that represents the way everything is connected. From you, to me, to the smallest insect, to the largest mountain. Being aware of this connection is one thing, but being able to access it is another thing. For all magical creatures that inhabit the world, this is something known intrinsically since birth. For unicorns, this ability isn't ever lost, just... forgotten." Starlight rambled, reading from one of the other books. It was a thick volume bound with black fabric.
"Forgotten? How so?" I asked.
"The book doesn't expand on that, mostly because it's something hotly debated among scholars and researchers. Some say it's something to do with emotions, some say it's a direct result of higher reasoning, in all honesty it doesn't change much right now. Basically, you're born with the ability, you forget it as you age, but it can be relearned with a little effort. Most unicorns have it back once they've reached secondary education."
Born with it, forgetting it, but with the ability to relearn it. Could it be? No, unless...
"What if I do know how to do magic already, and this damned curse is blocking it?" I wondered aloud.
"I'll admit, I considered it. But that would just be too convenient, wouldn't it? And could whatever set that curse on you even have the power to limit your connection to the world?" she sighed.
"Perhaps. The more I think about it, the more it feels like the right answer. Whatever did this to me must have had its reasons, not that I have any experience or qualification to even support that answer. From what I hear that doesn't seem to stop people around here, eh?" I smirked.
Starlight frowned at me. "Oh, shut up."
"That said, if this mystical energies of the world is supposed to be connected to me, and the curse is blocking my connection, and I need that connection to do magic..." I trailed off.
"...Then you're not going to be doing much magic until that curse is lifted. And you won't be needing much in the way of lessons if you can't do magic." Starlight continued.
"Therefore, the only way to unlock my magic is to break the curse. Our only lead on breaking the curse is unlocking memories, the road to which is paved with friendship." I finished with a nod.
"How is your befriending going, anyway?"
"Oh, not bad at all. It seems like I meet at least one person per day who might be a good friend. Technique could probably use some work, though." I shrugged.
"What have you been trying?" Starlight asked.
"Oh, for a while I wander the streets until I notice something interesting. I found Rags by following the sound of music, and Ginger was with him. Gyro fell out of the sky in a ball of fire. Pinkie sort of found me rather than me finding her, looking down at me from the roof of a building. Got hungry yesterday and wandered into a bakery and thanks to my ineptitude with money found Pennyfarthing who was willing to teach me how Equestrian currency works. I was half hoping to meet someone else at the Senior's Hall today, but..."
"I see your problem." she said knowingly.
I cocked my head at her. "Really?" I asked.
"Oh yes. You'd actually benefit from one of the classes we're offering this coming semester, Meetin' Folks 101, being taught by a certain somepony you already know."
"I don't have the money for post secondary, and the last time someone offered to help pay me for it they lied through their teeth." I blurted out.
"What?" Starlight said.
"What?" I repeated.
"Post secondary? Lied through their teeth?" Starlight asked with confusion.
I frowned, and tried to think, but came up blank. "I have no idea where that came from," I said truthfully. "But before we get distracted, what exactly is my problem?"
"To put it simply, you're too passive. You're looking and looking, but for the most part you're just waiting for something to happen around you, and hoping it works out to a friendship. What you should do instead is take a more active approach. Look for anypony having a problem, and offer your help. Sometimes all somepony needs is a helping hoof." she explained.
"I wanted to do that, but I felt it was too awkward and creepy to barge into a random person's face." I admitted sheepishly.
"Well you're an idiot," Starlight chastised me. "A lot more ponies than you might think appreciate random strangers coming up and-- you're right that is kind of creepy."
"See?"
"The point still stands. Ponies will usually like somepony else who's willing to help out, even if that's something as small as holding open the door for them."
I nodded in understanding. "Fair enough."
Starlight was about to add something, but she was interrupted by a distinct chiming sound. Instead she said "Let me go get the door."
It wasn't long before Starlight returned, and she wasn't alone.
"Howdy, Ink Blot." said a familiar mare in a cowboy hat.
"Hey there, Applejack. What brings you 'round?" I greeted her warmly.
"Well, ah had somethin' ah was goin' ta give you, an' ah'd heard you'd be at the Senior's Hall. I couldn't find ya after the show was done." she shrugged.
"That's when she ran into me!" proclaimed Pinkie Pie, as she burst through the door to the library, followed by Rags, Ginger, Penny, and Gyro.
"Hello." I said to Pinkie and the others.
"You gave Ginger a bit of a fright when you left, Inks. She won't say it, but it's bugging her." Rags replied.
"Rags!" Ginger said indignantly.
He rolled his eyes. "Tell me I'm wrong."
"And you didn't really say anything to us before leaving, we had no idea what was going on," Penny added. "Why did you leave, anyway? We were worried."
I sighed and looked around at them, people who I tentatively might call friends. I'd known them for less than a week, and they were worried enough to check on me?
I suppose that made them my friends.
"Well, Ginger, your song was beautiful. Very beautiful. Only... I knew it by heart, even though I had never heard it before. At least, that's what I thought." I began.
"Really?" asked Ginger.
"I think I told you all about my memory thing? How I couldn't remember anything about myself?" I asked back. Even though I saw them nod, I turned to Starlight. "Do you have a chalkboard or something? I need a visual medium."
She nodded, rolling out a freestanding chalkboard and providing me with some chalk. Carefully setting a piece of chalk into the claw device, I began to illustrate my thoughts. I started by writing the word memory at the top, then a series of scribbles through it and around it. Below that I wrote the word curse, enclosing it in a box and casting a line out to either side. Yet further below I wrote down conscious thought.
"To reiterate, I woke up a few days ago with no memories in the woods south west of town. In the time since then, I've learned a few things," I indicated the curse box. "Some kind of powerful curse got placed on me and is currently blocking me from remembering anything about myself. If I'm going to remember, I gotta break or subvert the curse. Somehow."
"Is this why you tried to pay for a muffin with a Triple Guinea and a Griffonian nickle?" asked Penny.
"Yes. When I try to remember things, the curse blocks it like so," I said, drawing a line from conscious thought to the curse, which bounced off ineffectually. I began a second line which snaked this way and that, before slipping through a deliberate crack I'd left in the curse illustration. "However, sometimes I can sneak past the curse if I access a memory without thinking, catching a little bit of the memory to take back. I could slowly chip away at the curse and maybe reclaim my identity, but there's an even better way to do it. Ginger's performance solidified this for me."
I paused, looking around at everyone's faces. Ginger looked like she was following, intrigued at what I was saying. Rags was nodding along, though it could have been to the beat of a song that was playing inside his head. Gyro seemed to be lost in thought. Applejack, already having been introduced to the concept, understood completely. I think. Penny seemed skeptical. Pinkie was doing that thing where she smiled and hopped in place like she was the happiest mare in the world. All in all, better than expected.
"Ginger's performance was probably one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard. Do you know why? Because my grandpa used to sing it for me. When I was a kid, he would sing it to me before bed, and he'd sung it to my mother when she was young. The very last time I ever heard him sing it was at my mom's funeral. Until I heard Ginger sing Ae Fond Kiss, I couldn't even remember if either of them even existed." I finished talking, not because I didn't have anymore to say, but because my voice had gradually become a forlorn croak. To finalise and illustrate my point, I turned the piece of chalk on its side and drew an extra bold line directly through the curse into what represented my memory.
There was sort of a stunned silence. I hoped this meant that what I said was sinking in, and not that they weren't listening in the first place.
Applejack was the first to speak up. "Ah... didn't know, sugarcube. About your ma." she said solemnly, removing her hat and placing it over her chest.
"If it weren't for me going to the Senior's Hall today, I wouldn't have either." I replied.
"That's... kinda depressing. The first thing you remember, and it's a funeral?" Penny muttered.
"Yeah," I said. "I ran away from the because it was too much to handle in the moment. I've talked it over with Starlight, and had a little time to think, and I'll be able to handle it for now. But I have a bad feeling that a lot of my memories won't be as pleasant as I'd like them to be."
"Aww, don't you worry, Inky. We'll make sure you get your memories back!" Pinkie declared cheerfully.
"And maybe give you some happier ones too." added Ginger.
"And a knife." said Gyro.
Everyone looked at Gyro. "A knife?" I asked tentatively.
"I made you a knife." she answered. From a pocket of her overalls she took out the knife in question and held it out for me. It was a small little thing, mostly for utility.
"I appreciate the thought, but there's a small problem." I chuckled, holding up my front hooves.
"Give me three days and I can refine the design of the claw device to get around that." Gyro said without hesitation.
"This thing seems to work pretty great so far, it's just a little cumbersome. Even then I can get used to it." I replied.
Gyro waved away my comment. "Not satisfied with it yet, there's a lot of room to improve. Mechanism is too touchy, there needs to be a way for you to use it with only one hoof, needs knife function, higher quality materials, probably be ready for mass production by-"
"Don't worry about telling me all the specifics, I hardly know what half of it means. But to all of you, I really appreciate that you were worried enough about me to come check up. If the situation were different, I might've actually needed the help." I smiled at each of them in turn.
Now that there was finally a lull in the conversation, Pinkie spoke up. "Party?" she asked excitedly.
"I like the sound of that, how about Monday? I could really use something to look forward to."
With that, Pinkie smiled the largest smile I'd ever seen someone smile. It was nice.