//------------------------------// // Thursday // Story: Seeking // by Fillyfoolish //------------------------------// I am alone. I am home, but I am alone. Home. When did this place become my home? This cluttered, rent controlled apartment in a dodgy neighbourhood of Canterlot? No, not the Canterlot. Human Canterlot. When did this human city become just “Canterlot” to me? Focus, Sunset. I am not alone. I am by myself, but I am not alone. I am with God. Maybe. That assumes God exists. Which Rainbow makes a decent case that he doesn’t, although Twilight is convincing that he does. It also assumes that if God exists, God cares to accompany randos like me, something Twilight doesn’t seem to believe. That’s the thing about omnipresence. Just because God can be everywhere doesn’t mean God wants to be or necessarily is. What if I summoned God, though? The way a pony might summon Discord? Say his name, make a fuss, then exclaim “draconequus”? What right do I have to summon God? Or Discord, for that matter? What if Discord is God? Horrible, unworthy of praise, God? A being so cruel that he created Earth and Equestria as a joke, and made them both so horrible in their own ways we would have no excuse but to turn to prayer to assuage our misery? Fluttershy said something about the devil. What if God is the devil? Oh God. I’m going to hell for thinking that. If hell is real. Which most of my friends think it’s not. So I’m probably safe. Maybe. Focus, Sunset. I don’t pray. I don’t know if I’m doing it right. No, I know I’m doing it wrong. Like I’m doing everything else wrong. I’m a failure. My inability to shut up and believe anything is my latest failure. I can’t believe that God exists. No evidence. I can’t believe that God doesn’t exist. No proof. I can’t believe it doesn’t matter what I believe. The stakes are too high. Focus, Sunset. I need evidence. Proof. Theology. Theory. Logic. Analysis. Philosophy. Introduction to French. …Why am I listing my schedule? Focus, Sunset. I need evidence. In some drug-addled irony, my only friend with even the illusion of direct evidence backing up her belief is Pinkie Pie. Doesn’t everybody else who makes strong truth claims rely on their emotions? Don’t they believe what they want to be true, not what they know to be true? That doesn’t mean they’re wrong, but I can’t know that they’re right. That would be easier for me, wouldn’t it? Being able to believe or not believe without asking questions because I want to believe. Knowing what to believe because everybody told me, all of my friends a unified front. Being able to choose just one friend to follow. Any friend, any belief, so long as I commit. That’s never been my style. Focus, Sunset. Other Sunsets flash before me. Sunset Shimmer, Shkia bat Avraham v’Sarah, under a chuppah with Twilight Sparkle, Dimdum bat Or V’ketifa. Winter Brown is in a wheelchair and can’t seem to hear much, but his smile is unmistakable. Bubbe Sparkle cries tears of joy in the audience as the ketubah is signed, sealing my marriage to Twilight. The two of us break glass together, and I hear Rarity scream, “Mazel tov!” Sunset Shimmer, visiting the Vatican with Rarity. Despite never having been myself, I play Rarity’s personal tour guide. I, for one, did extensive research before we came. I feel God near me in the holy city. I had my doubts, but in that moment – feeling Christ near – I realize I was meant to be a Catholic. I never doubt again. Sunset Shimmer, water splashing on my face from above, newly baptized. Fluttershy is close by, smiling, Twilight and Rarity on either side. Twilight looks around the church, bouncing her leg with a rigid gaze. But then her eyes catch mine and her stress melts away into a genuine smile, wider than Fluttershy’s, and I know everything will be okay. I have accepted Jesus into my heart, for He is my Saviour. Hallelujah! Sunset Shimmer, delivering an incendiary keynote arguing that true healing from the wounds of religion only starts when we liberate ourselves from faith. Applejack applauds alone in the audience, a tear streaming down her face. I’m fighting for a just world, a world that puts people over fairy tales, taking up the mantle that religion failed. In this crowd, not in the pews, I find the people who thirst for righteousness, the pure in heart, the peacekeepers. I know how evil religion can be. I saw first hand religion tear apart my best friends. After all, there are words someone can say but never take back. It’s too late for my friends, but it’s not too late for the rest of the world. I am in my element, and I know I am healing the wounded. I may not be happy, but I am fulfilled. Sunset Shimmer, chillaxing on the beach without a care in the world. Enjoying life for all it’s worth while I can. Looking up at the sky and seeing only clouds. To my left, Applejack whispers something in Rarity’s ear that makes them both turn red. To my right, Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash face off at volleyball like they did when we were kids. It doesn’t seem that either has aged a day. Aging needs stress, doesn’t it? Fluttershy stares out onto the water, quiet, contemplative, happy. Twilight sneaks a kiss on my face. It’s picturesque, and I know there’s no better time to get down on one knee and ask Twilight to marry me. She says yes! For the eigteenth time this month. Sunset Shimmer, encountering the divine with Pinkie Pie. We have a special Pinkie snack, and she guides my soul towards a holy wall. I don’t see much, but I feel a light. I don’t know what religion I believe anymore, but these spirits, I see them. They see me. I try to smile, and I feel them smile back. I am drawn to the light, and knowing that the light was near all along, I am content in my quest for answers. Until the next day when I wake up on Pinkie’s couch, hungover from too many spirits. I wanted to see the light, but now I see six lights, and they are all too bright. Like the people in Plato’s cave, I want to shut my eyes again. Unfortunately, there are yet more Sunsets. Sunset Shimmer, meditating. Calm, at peace, following the Middle Way. I am one with the air around me. Sunset Shimmer, forever restless, forever seeking. I am never quite satisfied, but I’m never quite unhappy. I spend a lifetime with Twilight yearning for answers. She is all I find. Sunset Shimmer, reuniting with my parents in Equestria. They aren’t expecting me when I knock on their door, crying for forgiveness. They embrace me and start crying too. Within each of my human friends, I see the Light. Indeed, in the bond I share with my Twilight, I see Sunlight. I was born a Solarist and vow to die one too. It isn’t easy to make up for lost time with my parents. It isn’t easy to forgive them for the way they treated me as a child. It isn’t easy for them to accept our differences of Solarist doctrine, particularly around their belief in the divinity of the Princess. But we are family. I need my family, just as the Moon needs the Sun. Even though I return to my home with Twilight, I promise to visit them. Nothing will break us apart again. I look away from the Sunsets to come. I don’t know if any of them are real. Maybe all of them are real. Maybe the questions matter more than the answers. Focus, Sunset. I see a white light. No, it isn’t a white light. It is six lights in a rainbow of colours, split from a prism. But in the distance, they merge to white.