Renown Composition stepped off the airship in the city of Canterlot, where she originally left for her vacation weeks ago. It was surprisingly simple for the ship capitan to get her back to Canterlot, and did so at the mare’s request. In under twenty four hours, she was dropped off on the street she met the airship at.
She didn’t leave without a hug first to Sound Solace, and a little thank you to him for being by her side in what was an adventure of a lifetime. But she didn’t stay longer than that, except to tell him that she’d talk to him again if they ever found the chance to meet up.
What have I even been doing for the last two months? she wondered silently as she gave a wave to the stallion while the ship pulled away again. What was the point of it, except to live out some hedonistic fantasy?
Probably for her to realize how badly she needed her friends. She imagined that was what Celestia was trying to get through to her. Of course, she knew that, but she avoided them for what? To distract herself from a silly love triangle with a different, seemingly perfect stallion? How selfish was that?
No more being down about myself, she scolded herself. I need to get my head screwed on straight.
She spent the next couple of days in Canterlot doing just that, opting not to head back to Summer’s Edge just yet, despite how much she missed her friends. Decompressing from what was an amazing adventure would probably be needed.
She rented a hotel with the bits Celestia gave her before she went on her trip, and walked around the city the next day to just take it all in. She heard before that it looked just like it did in the original TV show, but she didn’t know. It was certainly beautiful though.
She found herself walking into a city planning meeting at a community center, and found that she actually enjoyed listening in, despite the fact that she didn’t live here. That seemed like it would be fun to do in Summer’s Edge when she finally got back there. Agile would certainly like something like that.
And, of course, the second she thought about her friends, the pang of guilt and shame hit her. She could’ve invited both of them on that cruise, even if they were still really in the Outer Realm. They would’ve gone with her if she did. There were things they both liked. But of course…
She shook that thought clear as she appreciated the simple beauty of the elegant city. Designing Summer’s Edge would be fun, she decided, and left it at that.
Composition half expected Celestia to make Sound Solace the perfect pony she would love and want to be with forever to solve this, and was a bit surprised that he wasn’t really more than just a tool for her pleasure. Maybe a friend with benefits at most. She wasn’t sure how many actual conversations she had with the stallion. It’d be a bit awkward seeing him again later if things changed, but that was a future problem.
Of course, now the mare was once again expecting the alicorn to put in her path whatever perfect ponty she thought Composition would be with so she could stop fretting over idiotic things like this. However, nothing of the sort happened. She might have found some more friends– well, acquaintances who were friendly anyway, just like most of the ponies on her cruise– but nopony who came close to her true friends yet. Could Mr. Right stallion in Sound Solace really be considered a friend? She felt unsure.
Composition did come across a surprise emigrant she didn’t expect while sitting in a small coffee shop near the center of the city one day, around the time she was deciding it was time to leave for her own shard. With the disdain the mare she saw had for Equestria Online by the end of their relationship, she honestly thought she would never see her in here ever.
“There’s no way that’s you, is it?” Composition asked a pony who she was almost certain was her ex marefriend. “Fresh Fragrance?”
“Renown?” the mare asked back, just as surprised, then smiled. “It can’t have been that much time, could it? I thought I remembered you saying you weren’t going to emigrate until you were older.”
“I thought you said you weren’t gonna emigrate ever,” Renown shot back. “I’m only here because I was about to die without a new liver. What’s your excuse?”
“I think mine is the boring, ‘Celestia convinced me’ type, like everypony else here,” she said, rubbing a hoof behind her head in slight embarrassment. Then she continued, “But seriously, what are you doing here? How the heck did you end up needing a new liver?”
Renown Composition quickly reshashed the details for the mare she knew before, and Fresh Fragrance gave her own story as well, describing how her current partner had uploaded and was able to pull her in, too.
“Gotta say, best decision I’ve ever made,” she told her, a sentiment Composition couldn’t say she agreed with yet. “It’s so much better in Equestria than Earth could ever be. I have a perfume store like I always wanted, and I’m probably gonna get married soon, too, I hope.” Then she paused, and asked, “Do you still hang out with Cynthia and Drake and Eliza? They haven’t uploaded, too, have they? I’m pretty sure somepony like you could attract a whole lot of ponies to follow after you, I bet.”
“Ha, no. I actually told them not to follow behind me unless they were about to die or things got bad,” she explained. “It’s not like I wanted to be here, either. I… still don’t know if I do, honestly. I’m trying to figure out where my head is at and stuff right now. That’s why I’m not in my own shard.” Was it really a lie?
“Makes sense,” Fragrance nodded in understanding. “That’s probably how I’d feel if I didn’t have a choice. I guess I technically didn’t, since I was just following after Velvet Silk. That’s the girl we used to hang out with? Mandy? Anyway, you know what I mean.”
“I knew Mandy was in here. Actually, Eliza was kind of upset that she stopped talking to her once she uploaded, so you should tell her that. But yeah. It’s not great to have basically no choice in the matter. But I’m getting along as best I can anyway. I just got done with a six week cruise. At least, I think it was six weeks. It might have been longer than that.” She left out the part where she ignored her friends and spent time with another stallion while she agonized over two ponies like this was a high school romance novel.
“Actually, I have a question, if I can ask it,” Composition started as it came to her. “How did you figure out that Mandy– err, Velvet– was who you wanted to be with? I mean, if you uploaded for her, I’m sure you had a good idea that she was gonna be the one, right? I don’t think you’d do that for just anypony.”
“Yeah, I don’t think I would,” she agreed thoughtfully, but then shrugged her shoulders after a moment of consideration. “I don’t know how I came to the conclusion though. I mean… I guess since everypony always talks about how Celestia wants us to be satisfied, I knew I would be satisfied if I followed her? Don’t ask me how I knew though. I don’t have a clue.”
What unhelpful advice. That sounded like it amounted to little more than ‘follow your heart’ to Composition. It’d be great if she was in third grade, or felt unsure, but that was the issue. She wasn’t unsure. If she was, the answer would be clear to her by now, and she wouldn't be in Canterlot wasting her time away from her group of friends.
“Sorry,” Fragrance apologized, reading the look on the gray mare’s face. “Can’t really say more than that, cause I don’t know.”
“It’s fine,” Composition said, a little dejected. “Just trying to wrap my head around all of this. Thanks for trying though. Anyway, I wanna hear more about what you’ve been up to. You said you owned a perfume shop? That makes me wanna go gardening if I can.”
“Well, you are an Earth Pony, after all. It’s why I wanted to be one.”
The two took some time to catch up, a few hours of them sitting in the cafe sipping tea and coffee before Fragrance showed her the store she owned just around the block. It was a nice time, but a few hours was all Composition could manage before she started to feel too bad about all of this. She offered her goodbyes and wished her well and gave an assurance that she would come back soon to buy something before she finally walked out. A fine time, but it was probably for the best that she kept her interactions with her ex limited.
Renown Composition wandered aimlessly from there, very little on her mind as she found herself at the city’s edge and eventually descending into the valley below the mountain Canterlot sat on. There, she sat on her haunches, looking out at a winding river running through a large field that extended for what had to be miles. The sun was bright, and occasional clouds blocked the light when it felt like the heat was getting too intense. It was nice.
“Ugh, why am I like this?” she wondered aloud to no one. “God, just give me an answer. Err, Celestia, I guess. I’m probably just overthinking this anyway and agonizing for no reason.”
She didn’t know, but after that talk with Fresh Fragrance, she was starting to wonder if Celestia’s suggestion of taking time for herself was good advice at all. Wouldn’t it have been more satisfying to get over it and hang out with her friends and let whatever might happen, happen? It’d be more productive at least. Certainly more than the last six weeks she spent basically doing nothing but living in a fantasy.
“I should probably get on with it and go back to my shard,” she said to no one. “It’s not like staying in Canterlot is helping. I could at least be having fun there.”
She should just stop overthinking it. Celestia could read her mind, after all. The second she uploaded, the AI goddess knew everything there was about her. The alicorn had probably calculated out to whatever impossible time period what the most satisfying outcome of Composition’s life would be, and would just fix it to have everything end up that way anyway. She was pretty sure sitting here and feeling sorry for herself while she ignored her friends wasn’t the plan. Or maybe it was since she told her to do exactly what she’d been doing for almost two months.
But what was there to even worry about, truly? Other than the feeling of missing out?
Of course, Celestia was reading her mind, because right on cue, the alicorn princess appeared before her, with both Agile Trace and Solar Spark standing in front of her. She couldn’t say she felt as happy before about that fact as she did then, and started to tear up as she smiled and made her way over to hug them.