//------------------------------// // Awaken // Story: Monochrome // by SilverQuilled //------------------------------// "Grayscale?" A voice called. "Grayscale? Where are you?" "I'm right here!" A tiny mote of a voice replied. "Right here! Behind you!" "Please, Grayscale, this isn't funny!" The voice moved on. "Stop hiding!" "I-I'm not! Mommy! Wait for me! Mommy!" "MOMMY!" Grayscale bolted awake. Oh. It had been that dream again. He really hated that one. The charcoal stallion crawled out of bed, the covers trailing along behind him. Celestia's beautiful dawn had come, warming the horizon. The stallion sighed and rubbed the bridge of his muzzle. When he was six, his mother had taken him to the park. When it was time to go, she searched and searched for him, but she could never find him, even though the little colt had been right behind her. In the end, she almost left him behind before he finally got her to notice him. Grayscale had never told her exactly how much this had traumatized him. Grayscale was not exactly what you'd call an interesting stallion. His fur was a plain ash, with a short, well-styled mane and tail a few tones darker. No brilliant red or gold for him! Even his eyes were ordinary- just a dull iron, the color of an old fence. To make this worse, even his cutie mark was uninteresting- just three horseshoes, the symbol of an ordinary worker. To top it all off, he didn't even have wings or a horn, let alone both, like all those crazy alicorns sprouting up all over the place to save the world from nightmarish doom. In short, Grayscale was very mediocre. The normal earth pony was now eating a breakfast of oats with a drizzle of honey, just like every day. It never really occurred to him just exactly how monotonous his life could be. Let alone how interesting it would become. Grayscale trotted out of his drab apartment, fully intent on going to his job at the Bureau of Organization and wasting another day of his life in a tiny cubicle. In all frankness, there were insane asylums with better conditions than the ones he was in. Whether or not the earth pony stallion knew this, he never complained. Grayscale wasn't the type to do that. Working overtime? Oh, it's not a bother. Months of meticulous paperwork ruined? Don't worry; I'll fix it. Apartment complex flooded? It'll be back to normal soon. If he had not been so caught up in his thoughts about the whole "Great and Powerful Trixie" kerfuffle that was taking the office months to sort through, he might have looked where he was going. It is fortunate for our story that he did not. As he was considering just dumping the whole thing on Mechanical Pencil's hooves, he thwacked solidly into the most vibrant mare he ever saw. "Ohmygosh," He squeaked, jarred out of his comfortable little world. "I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to bump into you!" The mare shook her head violently for a second. "Oh, I don't mind," She said in a cheerful voice. "I need to stop rushing around everywhere. Then I'll be able to pay more attention." As Grayscale helped her back up to her hooves, his breath was taken away. This was possibly because she was the most brilliant pony he had ever seen, but more likely because she had cannoned into him with the force of a runaway steam locomotive. Her mane began as a fiery crimson, cycling through the colors of the rainbow as it went down the lengths of her tresses. Her coat was a pure, almost blinding white. "Well, in all fairness, I wasn't paying much attention either." Grayscale responded politely. She waved her hoof carelessly. "Nah, it's okay. You handled all of this pretty well, anyways. Well, I gotta split! Places to go, ponies to see!" "Bu-" Grayscale barely managed to get anything out before the rainbow mare bounded away. He turned to go, but his hoof caught on something: a small crystal triangular prism. "Great," He muttered, stowing the oddity in his briefcase. "She left her stuff behind." Grayscale tried to push the memory of the multicolored mare out of his head, but it hung with him persistently all day. It was especially annoying as he tried to finish off the two shipping lists he was working on simultaneously. He kept thinking about her mane, how she was everything he wasn't: bold, beautiful. It was ten minutes after lunch break, and Grayscale had yet to return to work. It really was exciting seeing somepony else, instead of the same coworkers day in and day out. He glanced at his boring mass-produced calendar and realized he would be off tomorrow; it was Peace Day. Maybe he should go out and look around Stonehoof, the city he lived and worked in. He frowned as he realized even the name of his city was boring. Yes, Grayscale definitely needed a break. He was about to return to a particularly tricky formula when a flash of something caught the corner of his eye. He swiveled to face the window. There it was! A speck of red, floating in the perpetually-gray sky. He smiled. It wasn't very often he saw anything like that. In fact, when was the last time he had seen anypony fly a kite? Grayscale's brow contracted. He really couldn't remember almost any time he had seen colts and fillies playing; they didn't cross his path very often. "Come on, Grayscale," He said to himself. "Get back to work. There's a lot to do. Daydreams can wait." It was late by the time Grayscale got out of the BoO. Celestia's sun was resting serenely on the horizon, emitting a fierce reddish-pinkish glow. He paused for a moment in the Bureau's doors, savoring the beauty of it all. It truely was magnificent. Grayscale sat in a chair at home, turning the triangular crystal over in his hooves. He wasn't exactly sure what it was or what it was supposed to do. It certainly seemed ordinary enough. He sighed in temporary defeat and laid the strange artifact aside. He would go out tomorrow and find someone who could tell him what it did. But for now, it was time to sleep.