I am perfectly still.
One of my students, some time in the past, might have argued that relativity would render that statement meaningless; she was, of course, stuck in her then-primitive books far too deep to realise that relativity went the way of the phlogiston around the time there ceased to be mundane matter.
Past tense even then, of course, very certain, very concrete.
Abstract for them, certainly, and perhaps even once for me.
I hum to myself in the vacuum, glancing a bit at my star to ensure that I’m not actually rotating without knowing it; there would still be the dust of the little world I once held dominion over, of course, to interrupt my poetically motionless state, but that’s inconsequential enough that I can easily put it at the back of my mind.
After all, there’s not really any peer-review authorities left to challenge my thesis.
I suppose I should lapse into madness now. It would seem awfully appropriate, and I have no responsibilities that my incapacitation would vacate. My sun is still alive, certainly, as beautifully radiant as it was when I first came to it, and it will remain alive until—
Well, I was going to say ‘until the stars waste away’ and that would be very poetic, but I suppose we’d then have to speak in past tense and it would furthermore be somewhat of a lie. Takes some of the impact away, wouldn’t you say?
That rhymed; I’d suggest reading it out loud, if anyone reading my thoughts in another dimension, or in a laboratory containing my brain in a jar, could be so kind to. I’ve recently taken to writing poems in my head and forgetting them; along with trying to think like a Trottinghamian, this has been my most successful endeavour.
Right, I suppose I must sound rather bitter about now. The decay of molecular matter did quite a number on the temperament. If anyone’s hearing or reading this, I’m assuming my brain-in-a-jar theory is correct; I’m sure you’ve gathered a great deal of data by now, so would you terribly mind bringing me out of this hole?
I’ll wait for your answer.
—
I suppose they do terribly mind.
—
I wish I could eat cake again. Not that brioche stuff, mind you; I’ve still not quite recovered—of course I am, but let me have my little bits of hyperbole as I sit motionless for eternity—from the last time I suggested that my subjects eat it, and I suppose that a monarch must always represent her people.
That certainly doesn’t explain why I’ve not yet become a pile of subatomic dust, but whatever.
Back to the topic: I would most certainly like some cake. I would detail the specifics of cake, but I can’t quite remember which of the fruits that evolved over the last few billion years of my former planet would go well on it.
I remember liking the post-cherries. They made an admirably loud scream when you bit down on them.
I really want cake.
—
I take a bite of cake.
—
Well, that bit of madness only lasted a few million years.
Mind you, my brain isn’t utterly perfect; physically invulnerable, of course, but certainly not perfect. I’ve got plenty of little illusions, even sane; little stars in the distance, at the perfect size to sustain life, twinkling and so on and so forth—not physically, of course, but I can sense them with my quite probably unreliable magic—but they always disappear after a mere trillion years or so. Very dull.
I figure that if I stay over here and huddle down for a bit, real life should come to me.
After all, do I not have several doctorates in astrophysics and public administration? All honorary, of course, but one can’t possibly fault experience. I deserve a job, damn it, and I most certainly will get one.
The market, besides, isn’t particularly competitive. Consider: I am an immortal alicorn with millions of years of experience running a world, leading it successfully into a stasis whereby modern technology exists only for entertainment and war is a distant, painful memory.
Everything accounted for, I really am the best choice for any potential solar management position.
Then again, you know how it is. I bet you the moment I get a job, some transdimensional energy being’s gonna just waltz in through some black hole and just take my people away with promises of lower cake consumption, democratic domestic policy and guided scientific advancement into the space age.
Fucking immigrants.
—
I’m voting for the Pub Party.
The Pub Party, of course, is a little thing in my mind whereby I fool myself into believing that cider and beer still exist and voting for them will get me some sort of recompense for my years of servitude.
Speaking of cider, I really should’ve tapped Luna’s flank while her body was still extant; it would at least have made for a far more stable relationship than usual. Do you have any idea how annoying it is to have your lovers die one by one over the years?
Assuming that you live for as long as a pony and you’re not a zoophile, you don’t—and I can assure you that it’s incredibly annoying. At one point, I had to arrange thirteen funerals in a single century. Thirteen! Now, that’s just amazingly depressing. I've since had to run a funeral service for all ponykind, of course, but at least I could cry there without hiding my face.
At least the various Bearers of the Elements of Harmony had the decency to die maybe three at once—they tended to fall in love with the only ponies who could give their lives meaning and relinquish their immortality at the same time, the lucky bastards. Then they’d get a state funeral, and let me assure you that a state funeral isn’t nearly as boring as a private one.
After all, you can’t arrange a riot to interrupt a private funeral without arousing some suspicion.
And imagine the drama! “Luna,” I would have said as the moon began to descend, “I want you to know that I—”
“Say no more,” she would go in that terrifyingly pompous way as she jumped upon me, “My only regret is that the love that we have embraced dared not speak its name amongst our subjects; my only regret is that our souls shall only meet once more.”
She’d climax around the time the moon landed, and it would be the most spectacularly pyrokinetic bout of fatal erotic asphyxiation ever.
I mean, sure, the actual exchange was actually kind of great, something along the lines of “My sister, let it be known that though I blah blah blah we’re all going to die and I’m going to stay living forever without my little ponies and that really sucks,” what with the affecting emotional collapse and all, but just think of the ratings.
Now, I may sound shameless, but let me assure you that around the seven trillionth year your inhibitions about your own thoughts, if they’ve ever existed, tend to disappear like tears in the rain.
Tears in the rain.
Rain?
Water, lakes, rivers, forests—
Well, it looks like I’ve forgotten rain.
Damn it.
—
I’ve forgotten a ton of things.
I'm not sure why I've just realized that now, but I have.
(I gave up the whole ‘Trottinghamian’ thing around two trillion years ago, for instance.)
For example, I can’t really remember what my first words were. Something along the line of I am the light and the light is me and we are one as we must be, certainly, though it probably was something more like insert funny baby noises here for future generations to giggle at when I tell the tale.
I was always very meta, after all.
—
I’ve tried making music, but the lack of air isn’t very encouraging.
Really, do you know how annoying it is to try and make metal in a universe where every metal worth talking about has been utterly ripped asunder and the only instrument left is your sun?
I move a hoof up—this is a legendary cramp—and let my horn do the actual work, as though I’m in some bedroom of the infinite. There’s a few solar flares (my immortal sun doesn’t normally eject a lot of matter or energy, unlike those other, amateur stars, and look where it is now) and a very flattering sunspot.
This accomplishes absolutely nothing musical.
Fuck me, this hurts.
—
Now, without a frame of reference, one may wonder how I’m keeping track of time. I’ve actually got an atom of caesium-133 I keep sustained—yes, yes, I know, not as dramatic as a wilting tree mirroring my demise in itself, but much easier to maintain—and I count its transitions, one by one.
Sure, you might be thinking ‘how does this immortal god-being count the nine billion, one hundred and ninety-two million, six hundred and thirty one thousand, seven hundred and seventy periods of radiation in a second with her limited mind’?
The answer is magic.
I heartily wish that I was intelligent enough to think up better stupid questions for myself.
—
I suppose I should consider the accomplishments I’ve found myself with thus far in my little role. I can remember what I think is half of them; the unification of the ponies, the repulsion of the gryphons—hell, that went so well that when they finally rediscovered literacy they started calling themselves ‘griffons’, like some kind of gelded cousin—the discovery of cold fusion and about a few thousand things besides. I’ve ruled over at least three civilizations, if we count that little singularity I kept under control.
I’ve accomplished more than any mortal pony could, and have outlived every single one of them; this is my eternal reward.
Huh.
I’ve actually thought of it that way a few quadrillion times before in the last eternity—that is to say, in the last googol seconds, give or take a few trillion—but I must admit that this is an interesting way to think about it.
—
You know, I actually do spend a lot of time stopping myself from lapsing into insanity.
I have no clue why. I fail quite a lot, of course, and spend on average a few billion years now and then living out my lives among my former subjects, but I always force myself to come back. I think I’ve still got a bit of the old Celestia left in me.
But really, there’s actually something I haven’t contemplated before. Maybe the jar my brain’s in has some sort of anti-that-idea serum in it and I’ve just gotten a new jar, but I’ve never actually thought of it this way:
What if I constructed these states and then went into them, knowing they weren’t real?
Stay with me, here.
I think if I ever do that—if I ever make a world in my head and have fun with it—it'll be a nice world. It'll be like a foal's show: not perfect, but without all those little Hearth's Warming atrocities and those suicidally codependent Elements. It wouldn't have a moon with a decaying orbit and the key to the entire world's happiness would be kept safely in a little crystal town which I and the Elements will save from certain destruction, rendering redundant long wars of attrition.
Maybe I'll even make it a world where I can be in danger, and maybe it'll even be a world where I can die.
Nah, that's taking it a bit far.
Still, I think I'm going to do it, and I think I'm going to have a cute little name for it.
I think I’ll call it Equestria.
Much better than ‘Equus’.
Ugh.