//------------------------------// // Research // Story: Better off without me // by SunnyBreeze //------------------------------// “You know it's the middle of the day, right?” Rainbow asked with a raised eyebrow. “I know,” replied Zephyr. “Siesta!” he announced, waving a hoof in the air as maracas magically played in the background. He walked confidently up the steps, hoping that everypony might actually believe that he was planning to sleep. Because he would not want anypony to interrupt him this afternoon. Oh, pegasi shit, he forgot to bring his bags in. He considered going down to get them, but he honestly didn’t have the energy. He felt that if he were to go back down now, he would simply break-down in tears. He hated the feeling of taking advantage of his parents, especially since it had become somewhat of a bad habit, but right now, he needed their help, but couldn’t let them know why. “Oh, I almost forgot! All my stuff is out front. Wanna grab that for me, Pops?” a nervous laugh came out, which he mostly managed to stifle, and raised his nose in the air as if he were a noble pony, in the hope that his laugh could be confused for a short laugh of confidence. “Thanks,” he added. Zephyr entered his room and sat on his bed, rubbing his hooves together in small circles as he waited for his father to arrive with his stuff. His mom had brought up the smaller bags, but he needed the suitcase. Zephyr’s silent fidgeting was interrupted by a few grunts coming from downstairs as his father used his head to slowly nudge the case up the stairs. “Here go you go son” came his father’s voice with a sigh of relief that he was able to finally get the case to the top without having to embarrass himself by asking for Fluttershy’s help. “Thanks Pops.” Zephyr bit his teeth into the suitcase handle and began to drag the case inside. “I’ll just excuse myself”, said Mr. Shy as he left the room, flapping his wings to create a breeze parallel to the door. The door eerily closed itself shut with nothing but the sound of a slight click as the lock fell in place. Zephyr opened the case to reveal an array of books packed densely inside. The musty scent of the pages bringing back memories of how he found them... Zephyr was on his way to Canterlot in search of more concrete answers. Zephyr could have flown the whole way there, but like his sister, he was never a strong flyer, so he didn’t want to fight the air currents. Instead he flew down to Ponyville and caught the train. He thought that he noticed a glimpse of a certain pink pony, but it was unlikely to be who he thought. Still, just in case, he quickly darted around the corner to avoid her. Upon arriving at the station, Zephyr trotted off, and took a deep breath. “HIA ZEPH!” a pink pony called out as she bounded off a nearby carriage. “IT WAS YOU! Ha Ha, I knew it! Where are you going?” Fortunately, Zephyr had mentally prepared an answer for this in case of questioning. “Hi Pinkie Pie, I just needed to do some research at the Canterlot Library for a… research project.” “Ohhhh… That sounds fun! Can I come?” the now slightly irritating pink pony asked. Fluttershy loved to talk about her friends, but Zephyr didn’t remember her mentioning anything about Pinkie being interested in books, Fluttershy always made her sound more like the party type. Why did she have to get so interested in books now? “Sorry Pinkie, but the mane style techniques I’m researching are a trade secret. I can’t let anypony see, not even a trusted friend of my sister.” “Not even if I Pinkie Promise?” Pinkie pleaded. Pinkie noticed an expression on Zephyr’s face that matched that of one of her other friends, a cranky mule to be precise. “Okey Dokey” Pinkie Pie grinned and bounded away. Zephyr couldn’t help but admire her style. He felt guilty for rejecting her like that, and truth told, he would love to be her friend. He would love to have anypony as a friend. However, Zephyr knew that his death would cause enough misery as is. Now was the time to distance himself as far from everypony as possible in order to minimise the pain that they would feel. When Zephyr reached the library, he immediately headed over to the restricted section. This section contained: ancient spells considered too violent to speak of in modern Equestrian society; seedy stories about horse phalluses; as well as miscellaneous texts describing encounters with humans, placed in this section after Fluttershy had expressed curiosity over the human diet upon Twilight’s return from Canterlot High. It also featured a felt board where anypony could publically post notes or images. It had originally started out in the romance section, but after Discord performed an incantation to link it with something called a “chan” from some other dimension, it was quickly rushed as far from public sight as possible. Zephyr, not afraid to challenge the establishment, at least in principle, had always had a fascination for what mysteries might be hiding in this section. However he had never been able to work up the courage before out of a fear of what ponies would say about him if somepony were to notice him here. Of course, none of that mattered anymore. If there was anything on how a pony could kill themselves, this is where he would find it. It didn’t take Zephyr long until he found a book with a title that perfectly matched what he was looking for “How to kill yourself”, in big red letters along the spine. In the cover he found a note signed by Princess Luna urging anypony reading this to think hard about fluorescent zap apple jam, then take a nap immediately. Zephyr ignored the note, recognising the simple trap. He didn’t need help, this was something that he could figure out for himself. Besides, he wasn’t definitely going to go through with it, he just wanted to know how he could kill himself so that he had all the facts before coming to his final decision. With a deep breath, Zephyr opened the book, realising that he had crossed the line towards insanity. How to kill yourself, by Discord, Ph.D. in Chaos Magic Method 1: Trigger a fashionista’s dark side. p.10 Method 2: Cheat a dragon. p.20 Method 3: Get zapped by a storm cloud. p.23 Method 4: Camp alone in the Everfree Forest during a full moon. p.30 These were all ridiculous. Granted, some of them might work if the right opportunity arose, but that seemed unlikely. They were 90% guaranteed to result in a lot of pain, especially the storm cloud suggestion, and 100% guaranteed to cause chaos, but rarely death. Zephyr wanted the exact opposite---some sort of spell or potion that is almost always lethal, but unlikely to cause any side effects if the suicidal pony decides to withdraw from the procedure part-way. Zephyr let out a frustrated groan. It was clear that the restricted section had not been curated with the same quality standards as the rest of the library. For every fact there could be hundreds of misfacts. Wait, what’s that? “The Moonshot Manticore Mouth Dive by Hoofdini, annotated by Trixie Lulamoon”. Trixie? Never mind. Come on Zeph, he reassured himself, back in school you regularly questioned your teachers after your sister showed you how to cross-reference your notes and check references, so you can also find the book on how to kill yourself. Think like a researcher. Suddenly he knew what to do. He walked over to the front desk. “Hi there, I’m writing a report on preventing self-harm within psychiatric facilities for insane ponies. Could you please point me towards the health service journals?” “Yes, of course darling. I wish you the best of luck in creating a safer environment for ponies like my cousin in law, Trixie, who almost lost her life after attempting the Moonshot Manticore Mouth Dive”. Zephyr took a quick glance at the table of contents of one of the books… suicide methods ranked by lethality, Table 2.1. Bingo. “Uh, also, I was wondering if you have any forensic journals?” With the books now before him in his room, Zephyr began working on his document: “Suicide Plan, version 1”. Using the academic literature to guide him, he was able to find a method that required only common household items lying about in the backhouse ... which come to think of it, would also make a pretty good studio. Focus Zeph. He had never laid out a plan in such detail before. His finished plan read like an academic paper, and contained 30 references, mostly citing articles in leading medical journals. It would likely be worthy of publication in an academic journal, were it not for the prescriptive nature of his document, the excessive use of “I”, or that his writing was at odds with established literature by using the phrase “success rate” to refer to “lethality”. Nevertheless, the most effective method he could find only resulted in 70% probability of death, and risked permanent injury if it failed. On the other hand, most of the statistics were for ponies who had been clumsy, like one case study of a mail-mare referred to by the pseudonym “Derpy”, bullied because of her strabismus, who was saved by a local timekeeper pony after she inadvertently mixed up her suicide letter with her delivery-mail. Zephyr, in contrast, was determined to keep his cool in order to ensure that his attempt would be “successful”. Finally, he wrote himself a checklist worthy of Twilight Sparkle, Write suicide plan (done!) Psychiatric screening for mental health issues that may be clouding my judgement Make final decision 48 hour cool down period Execute plan He was about to give his plan one last read over, but was interrupted by a gentle knock at the door. “Zephyr son, your mother’s calling us to teatime, uh… if you’d like to, that is.”