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// Entry 30 and 31 
// Story: PONY OR DIE 1 
// by MLPG 
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Entry 30, by PS


Entry 31, by Sanguinius

I’m just a face on a wall. It’s no modesty, it’s brutal honesty- right now, even as I strain to speak to you I’m resting against the wall of an AWOL fashionista, in a dark and dusty boutique. It’s been months since I heard another voice, and strained to make mine heard to them. Don’t turn around and walk away- this place can be lovely again. A nice coat of paint, some peaceful music, and you’ll forget that half of Ponyville’s population disappeared into it. Don’t around turn and walk away. Just sit for a moment and imagine the possibilities. Leave the door open. Let the sun in. Let the air in. Let me pretend for a moment more that I can breathe it as I beg you silently for your company. Just stay. Yes, that’s it. Sit down, even if it’s just in the doorway. Let out that sigh you’ve been holding in. Hold it if you must. Stay a little longer, and I’ll tell you a bit about the last pony who lived here. Not all of the bits mind you, just the important ones. All of the bits could take all the time in all the world, and we don’t quite have that. I don’t have all the bits to begin with, nor do I think that anypony does. They’re scattered bits, and you’re the first to hear any of them. So I can only tell you the bits I know, starting with the ones I first saw.

You should know there were once six celebrities in ponyville, and you’re lucky enough to be in the home of one of them. Everypony knew Miss Rarity. Lovely, well groomed, intelligent, refined, and certainly on the rise among Canterlot’s elite. Hard working too, though fewer ponies know it from the way that she carried herself. To run an entire business is quite the task- and that’s where my story begins.
Now I know I promised you a proper story, with real characters. She’s the main character, and I beg you not to make the mistake of thinking otherwise. Such a mistake would be terribly regrettable, for both of us. So don’t make it, just know the reality: She and her friends are the main characters in this little story. I was just a shophand, and I quickly fade into the background.
I began as a volunteer, though Miss Rarity insisted that I be paid. I shelved things, organized outfits, and made sure that clothes and saddles shipped on time. Hardly anypony commented on me, and they hardly ever needed to. The buzzing of sewing machines and threading of needles was the work of a true professional, and I made my work just watching and listening while doing the simple things. Gradually I was trusted with greater and more important tasks, and eventually I was allowed to model while outfits were put together around me.
It was quite the honor to be told by a passing gentlecolt that I had the figure of true Canterlot elite. I’d always suspected mine was a dumpy, flabby body. I was happy to hear Miss Rarity’s “Hmm” at the time, a sound she only made when cautiously agreeing with an idea. Over the next many weeks she began to weave a series of stitches and saddles around me the likes of which nopony had seen before. I held perfectly still, a testament to her trust. Gradually ponies stopping by would watch us and comment on the spectacle, as she laid in each gem, stitched each seam, and transmuted each outfit.
Now we come to the crux of the story of course. The cross section where I fade into the background once more, and you get your main character back. You may release that sigh you’ve been holding since you walked in, if you wish. You see, the ability to transmute matter is not native to a unicorn, and it made miss Rarity quite special. It wasn’t a talent she always possessed, but once I began modeling for her it was one she developed. All the while I focused on remaining perfectly still, and all the while she did her work. Over time, ponies visiting forgot my name, they stopped seeing me as a mare and started seeing just another wooden figure. I believe that was around the time that I started to forget things too. I had a name, and we all do, but it wasn’t relevant then, and it certainly isn’t relevant now. Staying still until she was done doing what she was doing, that was important.

Of course, when Miss Rarity discovered the truth, she was quite as astonished as I. She’s a good mare at heart, and she wasn’t about to allow me to remain suspended, forever a background object. Oh she made her efforts, and that’s where Twilight Sparkle enters the tale. Her inspection was quite the feat of magic, a sight I was happy to witness while I still had the sense, and she concluded it by announcing that I was most certainly no longer “animate”, but most certainly not “inanimate” either. I was a mannequin in the falsest sense, and I was still quite good for modeling and magic using. At best I was a set piece, and at worst I was a wellspring of untapped transmutation magic.
It was a tragedy in the beginning, but after awhile it became a minor inconvenience. Miss Rarity would begin her work with a mumbled apology to me, and when she’d close up shop that evening she’d thank me for my time. I’d silently give her the “ok”, and at night I would try to recall if I’d ever had a dream of something this wonderful. Gradually, even the thanks began to stop coming. I became a proper and useful setpiece in the truest sense, and she became renowned for her incredibly quick construction and transmutation of clothing. So we continued each day and night, until she began to take my silence for granted, and I began to long for speech once more. The work continued, and I decayed into stiffness and silence until I knew there might be no return. Miss Twilight’s gestures at repairing the damage had stopped coming over the seasons, and their talks about what a feat of magic it was began in their place.
This was the beginning of the end of ponyville’s nameless mare population. The two ladies who began the experiment were once upstanding exemplars of generosity and humility, but today’s Equestria knows them differently. The years are unkind to anypony’s ego who is troubled by the degree of fame that Miss Twilight and Miss Rarity were, and even now the grim truth is this: We’re just background pieces to them. We’re just inanimate objects to begin with, barely deserving of a name in their world of fame and madness. It’s no wonder they get away with the sorts of things that they do, and our exploits go untold and our names forgotten. We’ve always been this, and even their words to us are token at best. When they’re forced to decide between our visionless lives, or an element of excitement in theirs, you can know which choice they take. To them, the world only moves as they walk past it, and once we’re out of their sight, we cease to be once more.
This is, of course, the story of how our names were forgotten. One by one, we volunteered, and one by one we were steadily lead into a collective fold of silent and sentient mannequins. Miss Rarity has seen to it that we’re in every shop in Equestria now, a feat that she is famous for. To round us up would take a century- I hear we’re spread as far and as wide as the floors of Canterlot Tower. Some of us freeze in the last pose we could make as we tried to flee the streamlined spell that captured us- a spell that Miss Twilight Sparkle herself found while researching the opposite.
The process became suspicious over time. Rumors of nameless missing mares circulated the courts of Canterlot. Those ponies popular enough to have true lives and true names doted on our lifelike appearance, but those ponies without began to fear for their safety. Whispers of dark magic and lifelessness began to reach the ears of the right ponies, and the result was a visit to Ponyville from Canterlot’s Inanimate Regulation Committee.
From my silent post against her wall, I watched as the fear made her sloppy. I watched the concentration spread throughout the room as she and her partner in crime conducted yet another transformation. The knocking only grew louder, and the magic only grew brighter. Their latest subject lifted into the air, legs kicking, and the transmutations began in a race against time. A pony’s last sound shouldn’t be the slamming of doors, her last sight shouldn’t be the grim determination to make her vanish that those wondrous and awful mares wore on their faces that night. I bid a silent farewell to yet another nameless mare, and our story ended with a splintering of doors and a shattering of windows. This boutique hasn’t seen a unicorn in years since.
Over time, the dust collected over us all. We try, and sometimes when nopony is looking, a twitch of life comes into us. The corners of your eyes sometimes have it, and that’s just the trick- we’re all struggling. We’re always struggling. We want you to know our story, and we want you to know that there is a cure. It burns in our hearts and our minds, and stays locked behind our closed mouths.
My mouth is closed, dear visitor. It remains closed, and I can only continue to think my tale to you. I can only wish you to do what the unicorns never tried, and give me a name. Give me life once more, that I might move in the sight of ponies and know myself. Create for me a world with just a name. Just one name, and I can step down off this pedestal and walk once more. One single name, and my story can be yours to write.