SSRS = The summer solstice after speech was restored
As of right now, we are in a fireproof train car with furniture most uncomfortable. Most uncomfortable furniture? It’s incredible how quickly our lexicon atrophied. No, not lexicon. Our vocabulary remains intact as ever. Usage, phrasing. Sentence formation stilted even a full year later.
If Autumn Blaze wants me to write this logbook using “details and dialogue for easier translation to historic theatre,” I’ll help her in any way I can. Music history was the performance I missed most under the influence of that accursed stream. Who knew any of us living in the village would be invited to the writers’ room rather than divide ourselves neatly into performers and audience? There are two classes of kirin: those who perform and those who observe, but nopony exclusively belongs to one or the other.
Dear Autumn, here’s a detail to follow your dialogue: my next thought was to imagine your voice instructing me to completely fill in the appropriate bubble of the progress meter and make my mark dark. I shouldn’t rag on her too much. Rain Shine encouraged her mission to produce new musical histories, after all. The curtain music and Fluttershy’s introduction to the history she plans to debut upon our return both slam, though the climatic song is pedestrian. Is that a synonym for boring? Rain Shine did not only encourage Autumn to task me with making the project log serve as the scratchboard for a future musical. She also asked me to annotate this journal with explanations of kirin aphorisms during our return. Let seeing this remind me to annotate cultural translations as I review my notes. This is my reminder—as if pointing out the obvious philosophy in the prior paragraph wasn’t enough of a wake-up call to myself. Anyway, if this mission is successful, Rain Shine would appreciate the cultural annotations to ease in preparing the musical for export to Equestria.
The desert scenery outside sure is conducive to writing. Once a kirin has seen three or four cactus groves, they have seen them all. All that sand would be terrible for our scales! Oceans of ablation scouring sand to erode our beautiful scales.
Woah.
Seeing how jumbled my thoughts have been, perhaps less conducive to journaling than I assumed. Think through the steps, Springy. Springy. Oh, how I hate that name! The proper truncation is Spring-G. School was before silence fell, my graduation coincident with the last kirling crop. I hope I remember.
One of the Ponyville missionaries who convinced Rain Shine to listen to Autumn and restore our speech is opening a branch of her store in Manehattan. After learning of our metallurgical skills, she contracted with our village to create an iconic storefront for the new shop. Pure metal to stand out in its subtlety.
Myself, Winter Flame, and Pumpkin Smoke are on this journey. I’m here as the expert in fruit. The other two are experts in metals.
Woah! That cactus just passed by far too close for comfort.
Anyway, we will spend about half a moon in Manehattan. Our lodging and foundry are supposedly about eight blocks—whatever those are—from the work site. We were supposed to spend three-quarters of this moon there, but we delayed our departure to greet the first kirling to arrive since we silenced ourselves. We’re three kirins; we can handle the deadline.
Before embarking on the train, it was time to say goodbye to the village. The three of us stood between Rain Shine and Autumn Blaze between the central fountain and the social hall. Looking past the main building, the thatched roofs of our huts were our reminder to remain civilized. When one burns down, neighbors can take them in for a night to rebuild; when they all burn down, we’re in trouble. So be the cooling stream to the emotions of our neighbors.
The rest of the village formed a cohesive herd between us and the hall—“beer garden,” as one of the Equestrian missionaries called it during her visit here. As the fountain’s shadow struck noon, the herd instinctively parted to reveal the herd’s newest member and his mother. A green and gold kirling faced away from the crowd to suckle from Maple Brown. His golden scales matched his mother; his pea-green coat could have been gifted by none other than Forest Fall. But, blissfully unaware of the excitement, he continued to enjoy the concentrated lipids and minerals that would make his carapace grow strong.
“Greetings and goodbyes,” rang the voice of our leader. It was only for a moon, yet we were the first kirins to set out for an extended departure in many, many moons. Multiple years, all compressed away from our memories.
a.k.a. The nasal scales
I now stood face-to-face with Maple Brown and felt her orange flame on my maxillary scales. Her meaning was unambiguous: “I know you’ll represent us proudly.” I returned a cool orange flame of my own to reinforce that we all found her son beautiful. A wonderful new addition to our village after so many moons of stagnation. Nopony went in; nopony went out; nopony new to change our same old routines.
“He’s far too content to Nirik today, isn’t he?” I ask.
“At least for today,” she answered.
I blew a gentle flame across her backplate to gift her the extra energy she would surely need before stepping away to let my companions make their greetings.
The next kirin for me to greet before we headed out was Cinder Glow, my older sister. She shocked me with an intense blue flame of greeting. Was she ready to care about me this deeply after the fight that shut us down in the first place? Even more shockingly, I—I returned a blue flame. Was her face just as abuzz with energy as my own?
“You’ll have a kirling by your side when I return, won’t you?”
“You best know it,” she retorted before stepping forward to blow orange heat onto my backplate.
Blue flames and now backscratching? We—I blew my flames over her backplate to complete the cycle—truly have reconciled. When on our best behavior, there is an extra warmth between our kind. Solidity of musculature and scales to support the flames. The thin blue flames had unmistakable meaning: neither one of us remembered why we had been sisters divided when silence visited our village.
“Enough dilly-dallying,” said Rain Shine, “I cannot risk you crossing the desert at a gallop to meet the train.”
OK, she did not actually say that, but Autumn did request that I include detailed dialogue, after all. Mostly, “dilly-dallying” is outside her typical lexicon. She probably said something closer: "I see you have all said your goodbyes to your loved ones. They will return sooner than you expect.”
Autumn held the fronds covering the entrance to the cavernous shortcut in her telekinesis. Pumpkin Smoke entered the cave first. Before he stepped inside, Rain Shine used her unnatural height to her advantage and caressed him in a neck hug before running flames down his spine. A gift of agape he could not return. Instead, he nuzzled his mane into the tufts behind her hocks.
Next was my turn.
“Bring back some apples, won’t you?” shouted Autumn Blaze, wisely chiming in before she could ruin the moment.
Instinct kicked in and my face was buried in Rain Shine’s shoulder. Not since I was a kirling have I rubbed my face in another kirin’s hock tufts. Not since three minutes ago had I felt a loving orange fire across my topline.
“If you remember, keep an ear out for details on next year’s fruit farmer’s convention,” she requested softly, “I think the orange pony mentioned something about Fillydelphia, but I cannot remember the dates. You could do well with solo travel.”
“I won’t fail you,” I replied before stepping to follow Pumpkin Smoke into the tunnel.
The desert was exactly as expected except even hotter. As warm as constantly having flames on your back? Yes. However, the fur parts of our coats were heated, too. More like being a nirik without being so amped I no longer feel the prickling. At least Rain Shine slipped maps into each of our saddlebags while she hugged us.
Project status: starting once the train arrives in Manehattan