//------------------------------//
// Writers Block 
// Story: Me, You, and a Library for Two 
// by Dull Mist 
//------------------------------//


Writers Block


"Rosemary ran through the Everfree forest as quickly as her hooves would let her. Oppression oozed from every shadow, taunting her and willing her to fall. The evil presence that had been following her was hot on her heels; she could feel it in every fiber of her being. Even though the only sounds being made were the hoofsteps of her furious, terrified running, she knew that she was not alone. Her heart was hammering to oblivion in her chest, each beat sending adrenaline coursing through her veins and forcing her to ignore her fatigue, because if she made just one wrong move, just one small slip, she had no doubts that she would never find the one she was looking for. As she tore through the forest, she burst through a wall of foliage blocking her path, and found herself in a clearing. But she wasn't alone, for in the clearing there stood a..."

The pony who was sitting by the pond chewed on his lower lip, wracking his brain for a suitable creature to give the best impact for his story. He thought of using a manticore or a cockatrice, but those were definitely too overused. He toyed with the idea of a pale, menacing Vrykolakas, but decided that it was too obscure. Maybe a nice, terrifying Nāga, or Gorgon? No no, that wouldn't work, the setting isn't right. Those types of monsters were found in caves or swamps, not forests. A Sphinx? Same problem. Dragon? Too big. An imp? Too small. A ghost? Too subtle. Axe wielding blood thirsty Ogre? Not subtle enough. After some thought, the pony dipped his quill in the inkwell, and continued writing.

"For in the clearing was a giant man eating cookie with huge razor sharp teeth made of peanuts and terrifying dark as night eyes made of chocolate chips! Rosemary stopped in her tracks at the sight of the vicious treat and sighed. She gave off a frustrated groan and said 'Seriously? This is the best you can do? A bloody 8 foot tall COOKIE? Am I supposed to be scared of this? I don't know what's worse, the fact that you're writing this garbage or that you thought that anypony would find this scary. I'm done with this, call me when your ready to stop picking your nose and be a real writer.' And with that, Rosemary stormed off."

Silver Quill stared at the page he was writing on, and then he looked to the quill held in his telekinetic grasp, then back at the page. He sighed heavily, put down his quill on the grass, and crumpled up the paper so that it could join its friends in the pile of terrible plotlines. "When the character you're writing about starts insulting you, then you know you have a problem." he muttered under his breath." 

"A problem? Art thou experiencing difficulty with something, young Silver Quill?" said a voice from behind him. Silver Quill instantly knew who it was, as there was only one pony in Equestria who spoke in such a manner. Silver Quill sighed; he had been doing a lot of that lately, and turned around. 

"Why Princess," he said with a small smile, "I was wondering if I would see you this lovely night." Princess Luna grinned and flicked her tail in pride at his compliment of her creation. She walked up to stand next to him.   

"You know, We think that your name should be Silver Tongue, what with how easily you are able to sling compliments out." She gave him a sideways glance as she sat next to him with an amused smile. "But if thou thinketh that we will be distracted so easily, thou has another thing coming. Now, what is it that ails you?"

Silver Quill looked at the pond and thought for a moment. He didn't know what to tell the princess of the night, or if she would understand his problem, but he decided that it wouldn't hurt to get her opinion. "What ails me princess, is a curse of the most devious kind. One that prevents me from doing the one thing that I love most in this world and refuses to let me forget it." The Princess' eyes widened as she brought a graceful hoof to her mouth. 

"Oh my goodness, that thou were suffering so much, we had no idea! Tell Us, what is the name of this curse? We, as old as we are, have never heard of such a thing!" Princess Luna's eyes shone with concern. Silver Quill couldn't help but chuckle at her innocent face. He knew he shouldn't but sometimes it was hard not to take advantage of her naïveté. Even though he knew that she was millennia old, it was hard to remember it. 

"Don't worry princess, just an aggravating case of writers' block. Nothing serious." Concern turned into confusion as Luna pondered his words.

"We do not understand, what is this 'writers block' thou speaketh of?" 

It was no surprise to him that the princess didn't no what he was talkingabout, as she was only released from her lunar banishment slightly over a year ago. 

"Writers' block," Silver Quill explained "Is when a writer such as myself is incapable of finding the right inspiration to write. Usually I have no problem with writing, but this has been going on for a month now. Even being in the place that has always put me in the right state of mind to write is of no help." 

Princess Luna looked around. They were sitting by a small pond connected to a thin river. Wildflowers graced the edges of the pond and the dotted the grass around them, giving the area an enticingly sweet scent. Surrounding them were tall pine trees cloaked in shadows that only allowed somepony to see a few meters past them, but no more. They were in a small forested area in Canterlot, one that was never visited much because it was fairly out of the way. It was quite a scene, but what really topped it off was the moon and starlight that shone from the night sky. It painted the area with a mesmerizing mist of white light. It was the perfect scene to get his creative juices flowing and it had only become more perfect once the princess of the night returned and started to raise the moon her way.

Realization dawned on Princess Luna. "Ah, now We understand. So this is why We always find you here lost in thought. We had wondered why thou was always in this spot. Dost thou truly enjoy the night this much?" Silver Quill knew that while she was curious, she was also fishing for some of his compliments that she loved so much. He decided to humor her. 

"I truly do, Princess. I've always felt a connection to the night. The tranquility, the beauty, the sights and sounds, they have always endeared themselves to me. Celestia did a marvelous job managing the night, but since you've returned to Equestria, its splendor has increased tenfold." 

Even though he was buttering it up for the sake of pleasing her, he was pretty much telling the truth. He always did love the night, and for all those reasons. A delighted smile appeared on Luna's face. She ruffled her wings proudly and sat up a little straighter and lifted her head a little higher. Princess Celestia was showered with compliments everyday, but Luna rarely gets complimented on her work since everypony is usually asleep when she raised her moon. Because of this, even the smallest compliment would please her immensely.

"Well, we are certainly glad that thou thinketh so, we never would have met thou otherwise." Silver Quill nodded, thinking back to when they first spoke. It was several months since the princess' return. He was sitting in this very spot, and she had asked him why he was always sitting here writing. She had been observing him for some time, and he was getting the suspicion that she wanted to approach him but didn't know how. He answered lightly, saying that he was always most comfortable at night and it was easiest for him to write here. Since then she has been visiting him in this same spot every once in a while, and they had become fast friends.

Once Princess Luna finished reveling in his compliment, she turned to Silver Quill and asked "Wouldst thou like my advice Silver Quill?" 

Silver Quill smiled warmly at her and said. "I most certainly would Princess." Luna looked at him pointedly and said "Firstly, Thou art to cease addressing us as Princess. We are friends, so thou shall address us by our name." 

Silver Quill chuckled, and when he realized that she was waiting for an answer from him, replied with "I'll do that, Luna." Luna gave him a smile and nodded in satisfaction. 

"Secondly," she continued, "The root of the problem is quite easy for us to see. The fact of the matter, young Silver Quill, is that you are overworked." 

Silver Quill digested her words, thinking about the past few weeks and trying got figure out if he felt 'overworked' or not. He didn't think so, he hadn't even been able to get any work done because of his writers block. 

He made his thoughts known. "No, I don't think that is it Luna. I don't feel overworked in the slightest." 

Luna didn't look convinced. She looked at Silver Quill Closely and said "Thou may not be aware, but We were a musician once, a long time ago. We played violin, and composed our own music. We were quite skilled at it too. And We remember on several occasions feeling similar as thou does."  

Silver Quill was quite taken aback at this revelation. He had no idea that Luna had ever been a musician, and after he thought about it for a moment, he realized that it shouldn't come to much surprise. When one is ageless, entertainment is the most precious thing one has. 

"You were a musician? What pieces have you made? Why did you stop?" Silver Quill was much more interested in the fact that she was a musician than he was in her knowing what was wrong with him. Silver Quill highly respected musicians, mainly because his and their craft are so similar, yet still so different.

Luna giggled. "Well, art thou familiar with 'Lullaby of the Elders' or 'Symphony of Serenity'? What about 'Starlight Sonata'?" Silver Quill slowly nodded. Not only was he familiar with all of those songs, nearly everypony in Equestria was. 

Well, yes" he replied, "but the composer of those songs is unknown, and has been for centuries" 

Luna laughed at that, and adopted another expression of smug pride. "Not so unknown, we would think, as thou only started calling the composer by her first name mere moments ago."

Silver Quill found his mouth hanging open, and quickly closed it with a sharp crack of his jaws. He violently shook his head in order to regain his wits. "Well, that is quite... surprising. You weren't lying when you said you were skilled. But why did you stop?" 

Another one of her self satisfied smiles was quickly replaced with a one regret and discomfort. "Unfortunately, it wasn't our choice to cease with our music making, but our banishment to the moon gave us little time to pack a carry-on bag, if thou understands our meaning." Silver Quill winced at his own stupidity. Of course that was why, what else could it have been? Why did he have to make an insensitive ass out of himself? 

"Ah, right. Sorry about that Luna." 

Luna looked down at her companion, who she could easily tell was feeling guilty for bringing up unpleasant memories. A surge of warmth flowed through her, and she found herself thinking that it was a good thing she worked up the courage to speak to him when she first did. "No worries, young Silver Quill, We have come to accept our actions and take little discomfort in discussing them. But the more important thing right now is the issue of your so called 'writers block'. As We said, it is due to you being overworked. We have experienced it before when we were struggling to compose our music, and there is only one cure for it."

Silver Quill sighed yet again, fearing that he knew where this was going. He knew that Luna was waiting for him to ask her what the only cure for his writers block was, but he decided that he would have some fun with her and be completely silent. And with that, the two ponies sat by the pond in complete silence, with the only sounds being those of the night life around them. 

Luna waited for one minute, which then stretched on to two minutes. Silver Quill could see out of the corner of his eye that she was getting antsy, shifting her position and sending frequent glances his way. Two minutes eventually turned to three. Silver Quill found it increasingly difficult to keep the smile from his face as Luna got more and more impatient. Three minutes had passed into four, and Luna had given up nearly all pretenses of subtlety and decided to just sit and stare at Silver Quill. Silver Quill just sat stone still, and kept staring straight ahead. It was in the fifth minute that his composure finally cracked. Luna had let out a barely perceptible "Nnngh" in her eagerness to impress him with her knowledge. That briefly broke his focus and made him release a barely suppressed laugh, but apparently it was enough.     

"Oh confound it, thou were doing that on purpose!" Silver Quill couldn't help but give a loud laugh at Luna's expression, a blend of discontent and embarrassment, perfectly mixed for the maximum amount of hilarity. When Princess Luna saw that she was being laughed at, she defiantly crossed her front legs in front of her and turned her nose away from Silver Quill with a royal "Hmmph!"

"Alright, alright, my apologies Luna" Silver Quill said with the barest hint of a smile still remaining in his attempts to placate her. "Would you please tell me what it is that I need to do to get rid of the problem of mine?" Luna tried to show that she was not to be so easily won over, but Silver Quill knew better. He saw the crinkle around her eyes that showed she found it just as amusing as he did, and the slightly upturned lips hid nothing. 

After a few more seconds of pretending to think about it, she finally said "Alright young Silver Quill, We will tell you, although thou shouldst consider thyself lucky." She uncrossed her hooves and looked him in the eye. "The only solution to this that thy has is to take a brief rest from thy work. To let thy mind be free of the strain it takes from searching for inspiration at every waking moment. To take time off and let thyself enjoy life simply, and without hindrances. Dost thou understand us?"   

Silver Quill nodded. It was as he expected. "Well, I suppose a few days or so of not thinking about writing could do no harm. I guess I'll just walk around the city, go to the parts that I've never been to before." 

Luna shook her head and looked at him imploringly. "Oh no no no young Silver Quill. Thou must take more than a few days off. It must be at least a few weeks. And thou most certainly can't stay in Canterlot during your time off. While it is a wonderful city, thou needeth to go somewhere quieter. Somewhere more quaint, and without all of hectic busyness that seems so abundant in Canterlot." 

Silver Quill groaned. A few weeks was a lot longer than he was willing to stay still for. He was used to always being busy, always having things to do, or write. Dropping everything now and taking such a long vacation would be agonizing. He just wouldn't know what to do with himself.  

"An few weeks? Luna don't you think that that is a tad bit... extreme?" 

Luna shot him a stern glance which made him sit up a little straighter, eerily similar to the way that the teachers at his old school could make someone confess anything or correct any mistake without hesitation with just one look. "Believe us, young Silver Quill, it would take at least a week for thou to fully be rid of thy problem."

Silver Quill accepted defeat as he said, "If you insist Luna. But the unfortunate truth is, I don't know where to go. As much as I want to leave Canterlot and go out and see the world, I've only been out of the city a few times. and even then the city walls were a hoofstep away. And besides, knowing me, I would be beside myself with boredom. What could I possibly do in a smaller town other than write?" 

Luna gave him a broad, yet somewhat disconcerting, smile. "Do not trouble thyself with the little details, young Silver Quill, for we know the perfect place for thy to take a brief holiday at. And as for thy concerns of being bored...thy has nothing to worry about." Luna laughed in a suspiciously evil sounding way that made Silver Quill fear for his future.

"What in the world have I gotten myself into..." muttered Silver Quill. Meanwhile, the Princess of the night sat next to him, laughing.