From the base of the mountain, Canterlot had seemed a faerie-tale city. White stone, snow, and ice all blended together into a glittering union, denying the eye the ability to distinguish between them. Depending on the moment, the sun, the viewer, the city might appear to be entirely stone, or entirely ice, or some fusion of the two, like it was a city in a snowglobe and all its towers but carnival glass. And when the wind whistled down from the city’s high perch it was as though some great siren was singing, calling with a high and lonely voice for others to join her.
But faerie tales are not real, and when Starlight set hoof on Canterlot’s streets, she found the illusion broken. Still could she hear that siren call, the wail as cold wind whistled between buildings, but the sound was broken by cruel clatter, that pitter-patter like rain, the sound of ice flecks bouncing of glass, bouncing off stone, her goggles, her pack, her face. So close to the truth, her eyes could distinguish ice and snow and white stone, and see the former two crawling up the latter, entombing the old structures in winter’s grip, and when something crunched beneath her hooves, it was not always snow.
The ravens had beaten her to the city, and the race was not close. Unicorns and their brittle bones.
Heavy were her steps and slow was her pace, for she was greatly encumbered. She wore so many layers she resembled a great puffy cotton ball: two layers of longjohns, insulated socks, two jackets including a parka, a balaclava over her face and a hat on top of that. Plus her goggles. Thrown over her attire was a cloth harness, and behind her was her convoy.
It was made from three plastic foal’s sleds: one pink, one blue, one yellow with a pattern of stars. These things, once toys meant to bring joy to the young, had been strung together one after the other, and on each were boxes of supplies, carefully secured. On level snow, they made the going easy, though the snow was not always level, and at times Starlight struggled.
It was no practical concern that brought her to Canterlot Boutique, but curiosity and nostalgia. The front windows were smashed, for many years, snow and rain had made their entrance. In spring the interior would have been a rotten and soggy mess, in winter, misshapen dress stands made horrifying golems and shambling undead, things with the shape of ponies but faces of wire and melting flesh, all dusted with ice.
But it didn’t appear to be looted. The dresses and gemstones remained. So Starlight unhitched her convoy and crawled inside, looking for a particular item in a particular room, which she knew had once been there, but which a looter would be unlikely to find.
The liquor cabinet Rarity kept in her office, concealed behind a map of Equestria. The wine had long since frozen solid, bursting the corks of its bottles and covering the interior of the cabinet with what was by the point of Starlight’s arrival no more than a sticky mess. The mixers were likewise long spoiled, but there was a bottle of vodka that had kept well, and it was that that Starlight took.
“Thanks, Rarity,” she said, to the empty room.
When she emerged out the front door, there was another pony running off with her convoy. He hadn’t bothered hitching himself up -- the cords were in his teeth, and he was attempting a gallop as best he could with his head at such an awkward angle.
From the pocket of her parka, Starlight produced a pistol, its grip glowing a faint teal in sympathy with her horn. She was sharp, loud, commanding: “Stop or I shoot.”
The other pony didn’t stop. Starlight adjusted her aim and pulled the trigger. A patch of ice a foot to his left exploded, shattered shards flying in all directions. So shocked was the other pony by the noise, the violence of the act, they reflexively dropped the convoy’s cords. Starlight adjusted her aim to focus on their body, and in much the same tone as before she said: “Last warning. Next one goes through your head.”
The pony stopped, turning to face Starlight head-on. Their legs worked up and down, as if in indecision as to what to do next, but if such was the case, they never reached a conclusion.
“No sudden movements.” The gun was steady in her telekinetic grip. “Take off your jacket and throw it to me. Slowly. Do not reach for anything in the pockets.”
She could not see much of the other pony, as he was wrapped in as many layers as her, two scarfs around his face and a puffy green parka over his body. But in response to her command, a red aura surrounded his clothing, and he slowly removed his jacket, levitating it over to her.
It was a young unicorn stallion, anywhere from fifteen to seventeen, pale tan coat, fiery red hair with orange streaks. Without the parka, flecks of snow began to accumulate on his thin underlayer, and he began to shiver almost at once.
Starlight quickly searched his jacket pockets. She removed a pistol and a folding knife, and kept both. “Okay, now toss me your saddlebags.” These she likewise searched, though they were nearly entirely empty, having only a few odds and ends. “Okay, now strip off the underlayer.”
“I’ll freeze to death.” His voice cracked, like a colt in early puberty.
“I said do it.” Her tone made the consequences of non-compliance clear, and he stripped off the full-body underwear which served as his bottom layer. This too Starlight searched, though she found its pockets empty.
Bare as he was, she could see the colt’s ribs. His face was gaunt, and his lips cracked and bleeding. This she considered for a moment.
“Get dressed,” and she returned his clothing to him. “You look like you haven’t been eating. Take these. This is a granola bar, and this is a vitamin.” The two items she likewise floated to him, removing them from her convoy.
He worked quickly, scrambling into his underclothes, pulling his outer layers over them, and then devouring the granola bar in front of her. So quickly did he tear into the packaging that Starlight worried he might swallow some of the plastic, and not a single crumb of the bar fell to the snow. The vitamin, a chewable tablet, followed and it was unclear to Starlight if he knew it was medicinal or simply thought it was food.
“Sorry about the gun,” she said, though she did not put it away. “I’m not going to hurt you. But I’ve had several ponies try to rob me, and I can’t take any chances. I’ll give you your weapons back after we part ways.” With her horn, she gestured up the street. “If you’d like, you can come with me, and I’ll give you more food.”
The young stallion nodded, and after several long moments, Starlight realized she was not likely to get more of an answer.
“Okay.” She gestured up the street. “You can pull the convoy. Get hooked up.”
They walked that way, him pulling the convoy, Starlight by his side, the gun floating next to her. “So what’s your name?” she asked.
“Star Burst,” his voice was reedy, wavering up and down as he spoke. He kept turning to glance at her, and the weapon floating beside her.
“Got your cutie mark yet?”
“Yeah.” He didn’t elaborate, his mind clearly on more practical matters.
“What’s your special talent?” she attempted to pry with a gentle and inquisitive tone.
But he said only: “Fireworks.”
They continued that way for some time, with questions and short answers. Where was he from? Canterlot. Did he have family here? No. Was he with anypony else? No. How long had it been since he’d eaten? A while. Where did he sleep at night? Around.
“Have you ever been to the palace?” she asked, gesturing at their destination. So late in the winter the sun was already low in the western sky and its rays illuminated the white stone palace in a brilliant red.
“Yes,” he said, and for the first time he elaborated, “we shouldn’t go there.”
“Why not?”
“Lots of ponies thought there was food and shelter there, but there isn’t.” In a softer voice, he continued. “It’s been picked clean. And it’s full of bones.”
“Is there somewhere else near here we can stop for the night?” Businesslike, she continued, “It needs intact windows so the wind won’t get in, a hearth where we can build a fire, and a kitchen with one of those metal ponies inside. Do you know what I’m talking about?”
“Yeah.” He considered the matter for a moment, then indicated a side street with a horn. “This way.”
He lead them to a building that did not well match the city’s asthetic. Built at the base of the Canterhorn, it was a wooden structure, two stories in the traditional style, with a sign out front that proclaimed it the “Canterlot Mountain Climber’s Association Lodge.” The windows were intact and the doors unlocked, and pressing inside, Starlight found the first floor occupied by what must have once been a comfortable rustic lounge: couches and deep chairs, tables and an enormous fireplace.
“This is perfect.” Starlight said, turning to face Star Burst. “Get unhooked from the harness. Do you know how to start a fire?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll feed you tonight, and give you some food to take. If I put the gun away, are you going to do what I tell you?”
“Yeah.” His voice had no inflection she could discern, quiet and dull.
From her convoy, she levitated a bundle of firewood, two shoeboxes full of coal, and an iron pot of the sort that belonged in a previous century. “Use the pot to melt snow until the pot is full, then let the water boil. Don’t drink it until it’s been boiling for at least a few minutes. You understand?”
“I know how to prepare clean water,” he said, and although he took the pot he did not move, and instead continued to stare at Starlight.
So she put the gun away. “I’m going to check something. I’ll be right back.”
In a utility room behind the main lounge, she found the breaker box. Each switch she turned to the off position: upstairs off, downstairs off, kitchen off, exterior lights off, plugs 1 off, plugs 2 off, laundry room off, physical shed off, utility shed off, outbuildings off. Finally, master switch off. Her horn glowed, and its teal aura enveloped the breakers. Sparks crackled off her horn tip, and Starlight’s breathing became labored, her hot sweat forming under her layers.
Finally, a spark jumped all the way from her horn to the box, and when she relaxed her mind, the teal glow about the switches persisted.
Master switch on. Nothing discernable happened. Downstairs on. The electrical lights in the utility room, in the hallway spluttered back to life, and the teal glow around the switches dimmed. Spots danced in Starlight’s vision, and she realized she’d become so accustomed to navigating by hornlight she had not realized how dark it was indoors.
Kitchen on. The glow around the switches dimmed significantly, reduced from a bright illumination to a pale aura. Starlight considered the remaining switches, and bit her lip, taking some time to decide her next action.
It was with great hesitation that she touched the breaker box again. Utility shed on. She flinched, as if in anticipation of a blow. But the glow did not entirely fade, and her shoulders sagged as she heard noise from within the building’s ventilation ducts.
When she returned to the main room, Star Burst already had a fire going, and a recently used snow shovel rested next to the hearth. So far as she could discern, he had not stolen any of her supplies, though his eyes were certainly not on his work.
“How did you make the lights come back on?” he asked, as soon as she returned. It was the most engaged she’d yet heard him.
“Magic.” With a nudge of her head, she indicated the door to the kitchen. “You said there was one of those metal ponies here, right? Can you show me?”
The kitchen lights were on as well - bright, fluorescent tubes -- and “12:00” blinked on the clocks on every appliance. Collapsed in the middle of the floor was a creature that at least had the general outlines of a pony, though its body was made from stainless steel and white plastic, and where it should have had a head it instead had a flatscreen monitor, the thing a perfect square.
With a set of screwdrivers from her pack, Starlight removed its back plate. Star Burst watched with rapt interest as she again focused the energy from her horn, breathing heavy as sparks jumped from the tip to the machine’s exposed guts. A soft whirring came from within, and the square it had for a head lit up, displaying a frowny face.
Star Burst screamed when it moved. It pushed itself to its feet, and he yelped like it was Tirek himself, staggering back out of the kitchen and into the main lodge.
“Hey, hey!” Starlight followed. “It won’t hurt you. Okay? It won’t hurt you.”
It was like talking to a dog. Star Burst could not answer her, but only press himself back against the couches in the lounge. She spoke to him that way for some time, focused not on words but on her tone, speaking in a soothing voice until his heart ceased to race and his eyes were not quite so wide.
“See?” she nudged him gently back into the kitchen door. By that point, the pony of plastic and steel was standing, and the screen it had for a head displayed “:/” in bright green lines, along with a number of question marks. “It’ll just stand there until a pony gives it an order.”
“An order to do what?” Star Burst asked.
Starlight’s horn glowed, and the thing at once turned to her, giving her it’s full attention. “The kitchen and downstairs are a mess,” she told it. “Clean the kitchen and the lounge, throw away any spoiled food, and bring me an inventory of all the food and drink which isn’t spoiled. When you’re done, you will prepare dinner.”
“Yes, Guest User,” it said, addressing her as though that were her name. And it got to work, hooves moving with superlative efficiency as it straightened the space around it.
“Come on,” Starlight said. “Let’s go sit down.”
They sat on the room’s deep couches, near the fire and opposite eachother. Starlight gave Star Burst another granola bar and a bottle of water and promised there would be more food later. Occasionally, they tended the fire, adding more fuel or more snow to melt. Over time, the air emerging from the vents became noticeably warm, and the ice that had formed on the inside of the lodge windows melted. By pieces, they removed their cold-weather gear, until it all sat in a great pile on the floor. The steel pony came in to sweep the room, set the tables for dinner, and hang their coats on the coat racks.
It got dark outside, but the lodge remained brightly lit. Starlight waited for Star Burst to speak, and the result was an extended silence.
Finally, he said, “How did you make the lights come back on?”
“Magic,” she said, for it was the same question he asked earlier, and thus he received the same answer.
“Can I learn that magic?”
“No.” Gently, she shook her head. “And even if you could, it wouldn’t be particularly useful to you. I’m a very powerful unicorn, and even for me, running one small building like this is a strain. If you want light or to keep warm, you’d be much better off learning magic to conjure light or start fires than magic to make electricity.”
“Can you do anything else?” He rubbed his face with a hoof. “Can you conjure food? Make a fire that doesn’t need fuel?”
“I can’t make food out of nothing. No unicorn can. I can make a fire that doesn’t need fuel, but fires conjured that way use the caster as energy instead. If you’re keeping warm with mana fire, you’ll need to eat a lot to avoid losing weight. So.” She coughed. “In a survival situation, it’s usually a bad deal.”
He again lapsed into silence, but unlike before, Starlight filled the void. “You’d never seen a robot, before just now.” He nodded. “You were born after the disaster then?”
“Right after it,” he said. “My mom said it was two weeks later.”
“Had you ever seen electric lights before?”
“When I was little.” He poked the fire with the tongs, though it needed no work. Outside, a sudden gust of wind produced a splitting wail, and beneath the sound was that pitter-patter, ice hitting the glass. “But they only worked during the day. My uncle said they absorbed sunlight, but that they couldn’t store it.”
“He told you they absorbed sunlight?” Starlight repeated, and when he nodded she said, “Probably solar panels. With no way to store the power, they’d stop working as soon as the sun set.”
Star Burst shrugged, and she asked him, “Do you know what electricity is?” He shrugged again. “Can you read and write?” For the third time.
“Do you know what happened?” she asked. “With the disaster. Do you know what life was like before?”
“Mom said that one day all the lights stopped,” he said. “And that there wasn’t any food. That ponies used to just bring food into the city but that they didn’t anymore because it was dark, and they had to carry it on their backs.”
The steel pony interrupted them, trotting up to Starlight, though Star Burst still shied away from it. “Excuse me, Guest User,” it spoke in a harsh synthetic rasp. “I have completed my assigned tasks. Would you like to see the inventory of available food and drink items?”
“Yes,” she said, reviewing the list which appeared on its screen. When she was done reading, she turned to Star Burst. “Do you know what an omelet is?”
He shook his head, and she bit her lip. “Well.” Turning back to the machine, she told it: “There’s a large red box, there, on the second sled. Inside are eggs, two frozen loaves of bread, butter and various seasonings. Take that box to the kitchen. There is also a blue box on the first sled. Inside that is orange juice concentrate and greens. Take that box to the kitchen. There is a bottle of vodka resting on the third sled. Take it to the kitchen. Prepare dinner and serve it in the lounge. Salad as an appetizer, orange juice for the young stallion, a screwdriver for me, main course is Tortilla de Patata omelets with a side of bread and butter. And play music on your speakers while you work, something soft and unobtrusive.”
“Yes, Guest User,” the robot said, and it saw to its tasks.
Soon, the two were seated at one of the dining room tables. The robot brought salad, and Star Burst wolfed his down, the orange juice following quickly. He was visibly taken aback when the machine refilled his plate, and when Starlight explained that it would keep bringing food until he didn’t finish.
“Eat until you aren’t starving,” she said, as it filled his glass. “But don’t eat until you aren’t hungry. You’ll want to enjoy the omelet.”
“Why are you doing this?” he asked, fixing her with a narrow look.
“Well…” She paused. “Let me start by explaining what electricity is. It’s a… a fluid, you might say. Like water. And just like you can’t store water in any ordinary container, or it will run out through the bottom, electricity can only be stored in special containers. We called those containers supercapacitors. Have you heard that word?”
He shook his head, and she went on. “Well, supercapacitors made storing electricity very easy, and electricity could be used to make nearly any task easier. It was like magic, that way. We could use electricity to move cargo from place to place without having to drag it, it can make light when it’s dark, it can make buildings warm when it’s cold or make them cool when it’s hot. It can wash clothes, cook food, and make metal ponies like the one in the kitchen do our bidding.”
She picked up her screwdriver and gently sipped the liquid inside. “So we used electricity more and more. When ponies in Canterlot needed food, they could have it delivered all the way from the countryside. Just like your mother said, because nopony had to carry it. It moved on… do you know what trains are?”
“A big metal box on wheels,” he said, and his tone turned defensive as he added, “I’m not stupid.”
“Right,” Starlight nodded. “Sorry. Anyway. Electricity could make trains move on their own, and so we used them to deliver cargo. We used it to wash clothes, prepare food, everything. And the more we used it, the more supercapacitors we used, until it was hard to find a tool that didn’t have at least one supercapacitor in it. And then…”
She tapped the table and looked at the ceiling. “One day, they all stopped working. I still don’t know exactly why. But over the course of about twelve hours, every supercapacitor in Equestria turned to dust. And all the machines that used them stopped working. It was like…”
When she struggled for words, he cut in: “Like if every container in the world that could hold water got a hole in the bottom at the same time?”
“Heh.” She lowered her gaze and offered him a small smile. “You pick things up fast.”
“I know what it’s like not to have any way to carry water or melt snow,” he said. “It’s bad.”
“It was very bad,” she agreed. “There was still some electricity at first. The concept of an electrical grid is hard to explain, but… it’s like drinking straight from the stream, because you have nothing to hold the water in. But with no farming equipment, no robots, no electric vehicles, the cities couldn’t be fed. Starvation set in, then panic, and the electrical grid couldn’t be maintained. The last lights went out.”
The robot in the kitchen brought the bread and a bowl of butter. Starlight instructed Star Burst on the proper way to spread one onto the other, and he devoured two slices. “There are still some settlements out in the countryside that are okay. Places that didn’t use too much robot labor in farming, and that managed not to get overrun by refugees.”
“Can I learn to fix these old machines?” he asked, considering a third slice of bread on his plate. “Or, can I go to one of these settlements for shelter?”
“No. Like I said, learning to make electricity with your horn would be very hard and not particularly useful. And while there are a few settlements that would take you in, you can’t reach any of them until spring. They’re too far from Canterlot.”
“Then… why?” he gestured with a butter knife.
“I think you should know what you’re missing,” she said. “Once, all ponies lived this way, and I think you should know what that’s like. What it’s like to go to bed warm and… what a real omelet tastes like.”
“What’s an omelet anyway?”
“Baked eggs.”
“What’s an egg?”
“It comes from…” Starlight paused. “You know what? You’ll see.”
The machine brought a dish that was made with eggs, potatoes, onions and spices, and Star Burst said it was the best thing he’d ever eaten. He finished off the bread, and when dinner was done, Starlight offloaded two boxes of ration bars and a bottle of vitamin pills from her convoy. “These won’t taste great, and you’ll poop bricks,” she said, “but they’ll keep you alive until spring, and then you can find a farming town to take you in. There’s a place called ‘Ponyville’ that’s still in good shape. I have a map you can keep. I’ll draw the route.”
She did, and he asked many questions. When their time with the map was done, he asked her if there was more bread, and what a “screwdriver” was. She let him at both, and they ended up back on the couch, well-fed and in a mutual haze.
“How have you survived in Canterot this long?” she asked. “All the loot must have gone years ago.”
“My family had a rooftop garden,” he said. “And my uncle knew a lot about plants. As long as we could find things with nitrogen in them, he could make it bloom, and we had plenty of vegetables to eat. It was always hard in the winter, but the produce kept okay in the snow. A lot of it got mushy when it unfroze but Mom would make them into a stew.”
“What happened to her?”
“She got a cough,” he said. “And it didn’t go away. My uncle had me search all the pharmacies and hospitals for pills, but they were never the right pills.”
“And your uncle? Did he get a cough too?”
“No. Last year, he…” Star Burst’s voice got thick. “Slipped on some ice and hit his head. My mom told me that’s what happened to my dad too, but I was so young I don’t remember him at all.”
“You’ve been alone for a year?”
“Yeah,” he said. “And I’m not a very good gardener. My uncle tried to teach me his spells but I just don’t have the special talent for them.”
“Well.” Starlight’s eyes went to the floor. “Ponyville is a good town. They’ll take care of you.”
“What about you?” he asked, glancing across the way to Starlight. “What are you doing up here? There’s nothing to loot in Canterlot anymore.”
“I’m going further north. With the snow this heavy, the easiest way to travel is to follow the train tracks, and those go through Canterlot. I only came into the city to…” She paused, and her tail flicked behind her. “See. Something. That I remembered from before the disaster.”
“What’s up north?”
“I’m looking for a ship,” she said. “Called the Rikken. Do you know what a ship is?”
“It goes on the water.”
“Yeah.” She nodded. “Well, I’m looking for the Rikken.”
“Why? Do you need to go somewhere on the water? Up a river or…” He paused. “An ocean?”
“No. I just…” She paused. “I heard, from some travelers, that the Rikken’s wheels still turn. That it still has light and heat, that its engines still work. And that onboard, ponies make new machines, new metal tools. That nature has not reasserted its dominion.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.” It was her turn to be quiet. “It was a rumor. Something they heard from somepony. It might not even be true.”
“And you couldn’t wait until spring?” A frown touched Star Burst’s face. “Why would you risk traveling in winter to chase down a rumor?”
“See that light?” she pointed at one of the lights in the ceiling, which had not illuminated with the others. “Machines from before the disaster are robust. Most of them can be made to work again, with electricity and some gentle care. But that light is broken, and I cannot fix it. Next year, more will break. And the year after that, and the year after that. And every year, some of the ponies who know how to nudge the old machines back to life die, and they also cannot be replaced. A lot of foals these days can’t even read.”
The fire crackled beside them. In the iron pot, their water was starting to boil. “If we don’t get power back soon, it might not matter if we do or not. There won’t be anything left that can use it. Or anypony who knows how. It’ll be too late.”
“Did you not see all the bones outside?” Star Burst asked, his tone suddenly bitter. “It’s already too late.”
“For them,” Starlight agreed. “But not for you. I’d like it, if you could live like this every day. If there was always enough food and water and heat.”
“And music,” he said, with a sharp snort. “The music is nice.”
“Have you ever heard music before?”
“We had a wind-up phonograph,” he said. “I think my mother stole it from the palace.”
“Well,” she said. “I won’t tell.”
When their water boiled, Starlight and Star Burst removed it from the heat, and together filled her bottles, and put them away in the refrigerator so they wouldn’t freeze. Starlight returned to the breaker box, killed power to the kitchen and restored it to the laundry. She showed Star Burst how a washing machine worked, and for the first time in his life, he had clean clothes and a hot shower.
His coat, which she had thought was tan, was in fact white. The shower water ran black.
The top floor of the lodge had rooms for guests, and the kitchen robot made up the beds with clean sheets. Starlight wished Star Burst good night and shut the door, though it was some time before he fell asleep. He kept playing with the light beside the bed, turning it on and off.
When he awoke, sunlight streamed in through the windows, but the lamp was dark and the room was cold.
Downstairs, he found Starlight’s convoy gone. Her promised supplies sat in the middle of the lodge along with her map, and atop the crates rested his knife and pistol.
He ate breakfast silently, slipped back into his cold-weather gear. For the first time in a long while, he was well-fed, clean, and warm.
But outside, the mountain wind still howled, and the ice beat against the glass.