//------------------------------// // II. A Mistake of My Design, Not Yours // Story: In Which Everypony is Dead // by The Elusive Badgerpony //------------------------------// It had been half an hour since they had left the Boutique, and the silence was now only punctured by the beats of hooves and the bottom of a scythe gainst the dirt roads. The light brown, soft surface was firm, but yielded powdery dust with every step. Sweetie Belle had walked alongside Death without speaking a word, and without lifting her head once, concentrating on the ground. The moment they had left the Boutique, Sweetie Belle had almost fainted at the sight of the fallen bodies, strewn around like confetti after one of Pinkie’s massive bashes. It was not an experience she wanted to repeat, so she focused on the ground. They had left town at this point, meandering down a meandering road, fenced off from the nearby apple trees. The trees continued on for miles, threading over hills and valleys, dotting the horizon with miniscule dots of red, the summer sun overhead bringing out the green in the leaves. The smell of apples was high in the air, sweet and syrupy, gently assaulting their nostrils. Death didn’t stop, but Sweetie Belle heard when he took a deep breath, and let out a sigh. “Ahhh, the scent of apple trees. Brings a tear to me old eye. How ‘bout you?” “Huh?” Sweetie had been focusing on a loose piece of dirt that refused to break up as she kicked it forward, memorizing it’s shape, it’s texture, the sounds it made softly as it pattered against the ground, anything to avoid thinking about what she was doing and with whom she was doing it with. Death’s inquiry had brought her out of her contemplative state. “Apples. I’ve never tasted one, or if I did, it most certainly was eons ago. How are they to you?” Apples. Applejack. Dead. Big Macintosh. Dead. Granny Smith. Overdue. Applebloom… She sighed. “Apples are fine.” Death’s head tilted. “You seem troubled.” “Oh,” Sweetie Belle nipped back, “Did you just pick up on that?” Death shook his head. “I’ve noticed ever since we left. You’ve not raised your head once. What’s the matter? Are you frightened of the dead?” He giggled childishly, and Sweetie Belle scowled in response. “Don’t worry,” he continued. “It’s not like they’re going to jump up and bite you, ya know. Me scythe is a pretty effective killing agent.” “But… I mean.. It’s just… I can’t bear to look at them.” “Why not? We all die eventually, Miss Belle. It’s just a matter of time. I happen to be very rigid when it comes to scheduling. When ponies die unexpectedly or in unexpected ways, it’s more than frustrating to me. It’s downright maddening, really. I could be in a hospital relieving some elders, and suddenly, a train crashes. If people paid more attention, my job’d be a lot easier, and this world would be filled with less heartbreak. Are you listening?” “Hmm?” Sweetie Belle’s eyes had drifted, her thoughts filled with images of Applebloom, limp like a ragdoll, draped in her bedsheets, perhaps, or maybe in the midst of doing chores. Stone cold. Her eyes refused to tear up, but her voice was strained to avoid crying out in anguish. In guilt. I wish you would die. “You don’t seem to be listening,” Death repeated, and Sweetie Belle let out another sigh. “I knew the family that runs this orchard. Like, really well. The youngest one, name of Applebloom… She was a really good friend of mine. I can’t… I can’t look at the apple trees, because I’m thinking of her and her family, stone dead.” “You’re mourning?” “I… I guess…” Death smiled. “Please. Save it for when they die at their time, and even then, why mourn long? Death is, after all, simply the last page of the book of life. You have to savor those last few pages. Those are the best ones, where the artist that is the writer summarizes the emotions of an end in a few sparse paragraphs.” “But don’t you think about the end of a book long after it’s gone? Don’t you feel sad at the end of a tragedy, or joy at the end of a comedy?” Sweetie Belle was now looking up at Death, her head tilted. “It isn’t bad to feel affected by a story. It’s more worrysome if you don’t feel a thing.” “True,” Death muttered. “But the feelings are stronger when you’re in the midst of the story. When you’re reading it. Think this. When you’re with others, do you enjoy being with them?” Sweetie Belle closed her eyes. There was no doubt to her answer. “Me and my friends started a club, since we don’t have our cutie marks yet. The Cutie Mark Crusaders! And when I’m with them, I don’t think about the teasing I take, or the way my sister can be an irritating wannabe tyrant, or anything really. I just…” “You live in the moment.” Death’s statement was punctually matter-of-fact, and the smile on his face made it quite evident that he thought he had won. Won? Won what? “Why do you look so smug?” Sweetie Belle inquired, her voice darkened by slight annoyance. Death giggled in response. “I’ve won me a philosophical debate! Oooh, what fun, I haven’t been in one of those in a while.” Sweetie Belle’s head tilted, an eyebrow cocked, as Death’s step took a decidedly more dancelike swagger. “A what?” “A philosophical debate. The great battle of ideals! Where both sides present their case, and only one can emerge as the correct philosophy, as told by the proven fact of example!” He chuckled, and shook his head. “Honestly, though. You made some good points, but my position is more strongly supported.” “I didn’t even know we were arguing!” “Debating,” Death corrected. “The point is not to prove the other side wrong, it’s to point out the weaknesses of their position against the strengths of your own.” Weaknesses. Sweetie Belle felt a weakness, and she lost her footing, landing flat on her face, as if Death were to help her up, that would only make their current predicament worse. Or would it?... Before she could dwell on it any longer, Death clucked his tongue. “Minor starvation. It’s a good thing we’re so close to all of these apple trees.” He left the path, standing a few feet away from a low-hung tree. Getting up on his rear hooves, Death held his scythe at the very low end with his forhooves, and gave a mighty swing. It cut down a branch of the tree, said branch shrivelinging up and collapsing into itself on impact, falling to the ground with a thud. He gestured to Sweetie Belle to come over, but she shook her head. “No! We can’t! Those are Apple Family apples! They’ll never forgive me if they… Whoa.” As she protested, the rest of the apple tree had slowly died, shriveling up, the fruits falling from decayed stems, Death having to use his scythe as an impromptu umbrella underneath the fruit assault. He laughed heartily, which sounded strange, a scratchy laugh as if he were an old man. Although, Sweetie Belle noted, he was Death. Perhaps many eons older than he actually was. “Y… You killed it!” Death shrugged. “Trees, I’m more than willing to kill. It’s not like they’re in position to protest.” “If Applejack finds out-“ “Applejack and her family,” Death said, his tone quite serious, “Are quite deceased. Through a mistake of my design, not yours. And if you don’t get your flank over here and eat an apple or two, we’re going to have plenty of trouble undoing this mistake, are we?” The words hit Sweetie Belle like a kick to the gut. They were dead, weren’t they? It wasn’t like they were going to mind a dead apple tree. They weren’t going to mind anything. But this wasn’t a relief to Sweetie Belle as much as it weighed on her mind. Applebloom. Applebloom shouldn’t be dead. Applebloom was so full of life, of ingenuity, one of Sweetie Belle’s greatest friends, although to be fair she only had three, so the accolade was a bit lost in purpose. But regardless, the thought of Applebloom being dead just refused to sit on Sweetie Belle very well. And Death’s harsh reminder that she was, in fact, on a quest to undo this wrong only served to cut the wound further. She started to cry. Death groaned, and Sweetie Belle was certain that he was mentally kicking himself. “Sweetie Belle, there is time for sadness later. I can’t bring these to you, they’ll shrivel up.” But she could not will herself to move until the tears had finished, sitting back on her haunches, and letting a puddle of grief and agony settle at her hooves. +-+ She still had a pit in her stomach, but the food relieved it slightly. Sweetie Belle had wolfed down apple after apple after apple, sitting with Death, her back to the tree, trying not to think of Applebloom, of her corpse, the corpse that could have been in the fields at that moment, the corpse that would surely bring her to suicidal levels of grief. Death wasn’t very good at keeping ponies sane, apparently. At the most, he had cut her down the comfort apples. She had lost count of how many she’d wolf down in three bites. Or how many she’d eaten in general. The sorrow had brought her insurmountable levels of hunger, unsatiable even with an entire tree’s worth of apples. “Sweetie Belle, you can’t eat all of those feckin’ apples.” “Forget you,” Sweetie Belle replied, through a hefty mouthful of partially chewed apple. “I can eat all these apples.” Death sighed. “If it makes you feel better about your predicament, I suppose it’s best if I not interrupt. Although, I do recommend you slow down a bit there, lass.” As if his words carried some sort of karmic power, Sweetie Belle jammed her next apple down her throat, and her gag reflex kicked in. She began to cough, splutter, bits of apple going everywhere. Some of the smaller bits made their way up into her nose, stopping her ability to breath out of it, and she desperately tried to suck in breathes between the strangling coughs. Her hoof bashed against her chest, her eyes wide with realization. Death gripped his scythe a little bit tighter. He breathed out, seemingly in relief, as Sweetie Belle retched, spitting out bits of apple, turning over on her back, breathing heavily. “I told you to slow down,” he said, with a slight grin, a chuckle forming at the first few words. “For a moment there, I was worried me services would be necessary.” “If you still could-“ “Nay.” His reply was immediate, empathy and coldness blending in his voice in the oddest way. “I don’t do mercy kills. Personal policy. Besides, if I don’t have you alive, there is no way I can bring everypony else back. I don’t have any of that magic horn stuff. All of this anguish is temporary. I’d prefer it to be as quick as possible.” Sweetie Belle grunted in reply, turning over again. “I can’t help it. Everything that me and Applebloom ever did together… It’s just stuck in my head like a song.” “Then rather than mourning the fact that she is dead, perhaps then you should celebrate the good times that you had. Sadness is fine, grief is understandable, complete and total anguish is inexcusable this far into the day, especially considering how I’ve given you an option besides mourning.” Sweetie Belle sniffled. “Applebloom was… Applebloom w-was just such an incredibly…” “If I might recommend,” Death said, tilting towards her with an expression of concern on his face, “You not refer to her in the past tense? Because if we keep going at this point, we could get to Canterlot by this time tomorrow. But only if you’re willing to move on.” Sweetie Belle pushed herself up, shakily, anguish attacking her limbs and her energy, assaulting her mind with images of the dead Apples. Applejack prostate in front of an unbuckled tree, Macintosh lying not far away, Granny Smith slumped in her chair, Applebloom half hanging out of a window. But she fought back, with equally vicious force, reminding herself of housevisits, of Cutie Mark Crusader meetings, of simply being together with her and Scootaloo at dusk and watching the transition from day to night, and wondering when, if ever, they would get their cutie marks, and whether or not it ever mattered. As long as they had each other, cutie marks were peripheral. And if she persevered, if she could make it to Canterlot, then their adventures would not end then and there, in a cruel mistake made by a simpleton of a demigod. “Yes, yes, there ya go, m’dear. Fight the sorrow. It’s no place when there’s hope to be had.” “Yeah,” Sweetie Belle grunted, now on all four hooves. “Okay. Okay. I’m ready.” She stood on her hooves, her head held up high, the tearstained face and running eyes filled with an opposite emotion, her face straight as possible. Her voice was breathy, unready, yet to be caught. Death tilted his head. “You’re absolutely sure? I really don’t want to use this.” “One hundred and twenty-pecent more,” Sweetie Belle replied, still wavering. “We have to go, right? You have to get back to work. I have… to get my friends… My friends back.” Death shrugged. “I suppose.” +-+ A few hours passed. Death passed the time by singing, Sweetie Belle occasionally singing along. At that point, though, Sweetie Belle was silent, not knowing the song. “We've got a feeling of the day Last time wasn't what we made but we make away Love is our only true escape Fear is nothing washed away awake away awake-“ Sweetie Belle cleared her thoat, interrupting Death’s singing. He trailed off, disappointment tinging the notes and bringing a frown to his face. “I think I get it now,” Sweetie Belle said. “Get what?” “Get mourning. Before, nopony in my family was really dead taht effected my directly. I mean, I still have a great-grandmother. And when I go places with my parents, and Applebloom and Scootaloo are along, they always have this look in their faces. I know what they’re thinking about.” “They have no parents?” Sweetie Belle retorted with another question. “You don’t remember taking them away?” “If you’re trying to make me feel guilty, lass, I’ll have you know that I only exact death. I don’t kill willy-nilly, only when it is one’s time. Moreover, do you realize how many ponies die in a day?” Sweetie Belle was silent. Death continued talking. “Hundreds. How am I to remember four ponies when four-thousand might have died in a Griffon air-raid that same day? God, War really leaves a terrible mess. When Conquest tells him of the promise of battle, he just… Goes nuts. We know what Conquest is like, after all. He can’t get enough of it.” “What a dick,” Sweetie Belle said, with a smile. Death’s sunken face crinkled into a massive grin, a long giggle escaping his lips, before developing into a full-on laugh. “Yes. Yes indeed. Conquest is such an incredible dick. Now, let’s not mention it much more, I feel that the phrase is wearing thin on you.” Sweetie Belle sighed. “I need all the laughs I can get.” Death shook his head, returning back on topic. “Yes, mourning is fine in small, controlled doses. It is when it devolves into pity that one goes wrong. You cannot put your life on hold because someone elses has evaporated. You must enjoy your friends and family whilst they live.” “But you have to honor their memory when they die,” Sweetie Belle said. “Point taken. But I think that the debate is fairly well settled. You cannot spend too long. You have your own life, Miss Belle, you and your other friends. The realm of the living is temporary and fleeting.” Sweetie Belle nodded, noting that the road was getting steeper. “So we have to cherish it.” “Yes. Because it ends. And that is beautiful, Sweetie Belle. It makes life a valuable commodity. Something you shouldn’t waste.” Sweetie Belle looked behind them. Sweet Apple Acres was still in view, far off in the distance. Row after row of emerald-colored trees bearing sweet red rubies, held by wooden prisons, broken free by a strong kick, or a gust of wind. It was a serene image. But Sweetie Belle now found it somewhat exciting as well. She got to experience it. Got to see the beauty of the acres before the trees became overgrown, the fences crumbled, the farmhouse abandoned, or the farm was paved over for skyscrapers, or angry zebras poisoned everything with pink gas. That was beautiful. Because eventually it would end. +-+ She turned her face to Death, and smiled. He was beaming, his few pearl-white teeth beautiful in the summer sunlight. And so they continued forth.