//------------------------------// // Fling us a Rock, Piano Man // Story: Bass Clefs and Sapphires // by Crispn //------------------------------// Back in the cold night air for the third time tonight, I flew away from the apartment in a flurry of anger and confusion. She didn’t care about me? Or was it that she was angry at me for not having to deal with the same problems that she had. I know she was angry with her father, but that didn’t mean I should have to be insulted for it. I mean, I’m in a really weird position with all of this. I am already being compared to a sick sadistic bastard, so why was she also coming down hard? But none of it mattered, I pretty much just signed my death warrant with Dash and the others. It took everything I had to not yell or scream at her, but aaagh. I mean, what the fucking hell is her problem anyway? Flying over a small park, I quickly descended on to the bank next to a pond. I notice a few pebbles and started to skip them across the unfrozen water. After skipping a few rocks, I took a larger one in my hands. With a furious yell deep from my gut, I chucked the rock as hard as I could. It flew in the air for a few seconds before crashing down hard onto the ice, smashing a sizable hole in the surface as the water splashed over its frozen crust from its newly found escape. Panting, I was doing little to hide my anger. I chucked another rock, and another. Each crashing down onto the ice and soon, the frozen surface looked more like a block of swiss cheese. I looked around and found the largest rock that I could. Picking it up was hard to say the least, it must have weighed a good fifty pounds. Eventually, I got it over to the bank of the pond and with a mighty scream, chucked it as hard as I could. It promptly landed barely a foot in front of me. In my frustration, I started mercilessly kicking the shit out of that stupid small boulder. “Something bothering you, kid?” I looked down into the water. Standing behind me was Magnum. Oh great, just who I wanted to see right now. The father of the girl who basically said I would never understand anything. “What the hell do you want?” I barked out. “Well, I was going to talk to you about some things but if you are more interested in beating up that rock, I guess I will let you finish.” Magnum calmly stated as he leaned upon his cane, straining from his walks. I looked down at the boulder and back to him. I kicked it one last time, letting the last of my anger run its course. Sighing after my little tirade, I walked over to Magnum. “Ok, what do you want to talk about?” “Something Disc said. Talked a lot about your issues. Namely since your adoption.” “Oh great, Uncle Disc, tell the world about my shitty life, why don’t you?” “It all makes sense though if you think about it. Your family issues, drinking problems, the time you spent in Juvi. Said you were a hard shell, almost like a turtle, barely letting anything get to you after he met you. I’m slightly amazed to see a peg of your build chuck a rock as far as you did.” “Oh you think you can do better, old man?” I scoffed at the backhanded compliment. “I know I can.” He said as the infernal boulder rock levitated in a mahogany glow. Magnum then proceeded to hurl the boulder with his magic to the other side of the lake. “Cheater.” I mumbled at the smug look on his face. “Never said I couldn’t use magic. Anyway back to what Disc was telling me about you. He spoke of a kind soul, a generous heart and hopeful. Kind of like my Rarity.” I snorted at the last statement. I would not have taken my anger out on her. “I have known Disc for a long time. A very long time. He rarely speaks so highly of anyone, cynical as he is. I just want you to promise me that you will make my daughter happy.” “I don’t really know how well that will go over, since you were outside, but apparently I don't understand anything about being controlled by a family. She thinks that since I never had a real family that I don't have to have bonds with people like that. I guess thats what she sees me as. Just some random kid that means shit to no one.” I felt a strong crack against my left side. Magnum smacked his cane into me as he sat down on the bank, motioning me to do the same. “Now don’t let that get to you. That was from years of hardship and toil she’s endured to help me provide for our family.” “Still, doesn’t mean I'm worthless.” “No, she’s just hot headed sometimes. She is my little girl, was born only when I was 19, right around the time I was starting to make it big in college. When I got hurt, I couldn’t get work for months. When I finally got my current job at the factory thanks to Blitz, Pearl and I were in a dire situation. Debt was starting to mount higher and higher. Bits wre not coming in fast enough. There was a point I had the paperwork to sign Sweetie and Rarity over to a family that could actually give them a life, instead of scrapping one. But I couldn’t bring myself to part with my daughters. I took extra shifts, other jobs and whatnot. It still wasn’t enough.” “That was about the time Rarity started going out for hours on end without a mention of what she was doing. When she asked to take the job at the store, I was furious. I refused to let her work, let her work to fix my mistakes. But she got her stubbornness from me and I eventually caved. She was raking in bits. I didn’t know where it was all coming from, but I didn’t really care. I was just relieved that I was not going to have to give up Rarity and Sweetie Belle.” “You never questioned why she went out to the hills everyday?” “No I did, and when I snuck out behind her and saw her mining for six, seven hours, I thought it was ok to give her some space. Maybe help her find someone that she could confide in, if it wasn’t me. The son of one of the managers was a nice young peg, or at least I thought that of Ridger at the time. They started going out around her junior year, his senior year. She even applied and went to the same school with him, just to be around him. Convinced most of her friends that the school was right for them too. But he always questioned where she went when she would go out gem hunting. He thought that she was being unfaithful, but my daughter is nothing of the sort.” “I know, she wouldn't do anything wrong to anyone.” “So why do you think that in cold thought, she would hurt someone that she fought to come spend the holidays here, so that he could have a proper one with a family.” I looked at Magnum, and he just looked out onto the water. He cringed his face as he got up. “Stupid knee, it will never fully heal but if it wasn't for Disc, I probably couldn’t have walked. Like I said, in the almost twenty years that I have known him, he rarely seeks out people. The ones that he does seek out are usually downtrodden. I remember him telling me about this peg mother down on her luck that he helped out. Met her once, she had a cute little son with her, round Rarity’s age. She died shortly after that though. Something about a home invasion gone wrong. Never did find out what happened to the kid and I doubt Disc knows.” He looked down and put a hand down. I took it and pulled myself up, flapping my wings as I did. “She must really care about you. She rarely customized such simple outfits.” “Yeah, maybe we should be getting back. I think I need to apologize for some harsh words.” “You and her both. Oh and you may be sleeping in the same room, but I am not ready to be a grandfather. But if that should come to be, if you do not make an honest woman out of my daughter, I’ll shear your right wing off and place it above my mantel. Now come on, dinner is almost ready.” “Why does everyone want to cut off my wings?” I asked loudly to the now laughing Magnum, quickly hobbling away. When I opened the door to her room, I was tackled by an apologizing blur of purple. I didn’t think that a girl so tiny could do that, but then again, Vinyl and Dash could both pin me easily and they were much shorter. Vinyl was also considerably weaker than Rarity as well. To be expected when you work for years out in the mountains mining fine gems. Dinner had been delightful, a simple roast beef and salad. Rarity kept apologizing all throughout dinner, even though I told her that it was alright. Out in the living room, Sweetie Belle had started doing a little karaoke with Pearl and Spike. Rarity and I were sitting on the couch while Magnum pleaded with his eldest daughter to sing a duet with him. Eventually she caved and sang a rendition of Babe. I laughed at the notion of her, being all goofy and what not. It was pleasant. She smiled and laughed and joked. It was a good look on her. Now I understood what Dash was telling me. That out of all of her friends, she was the one that needed to have fun the most, and when she did, she would become the life of the party. Looking around the apartment laughing at a quip from Spike about Magnum, I noticed a small stand up piano in the corner. How had I not noticed the piano. I am usually drawn to them. Walking over to it, I lifted up the keyguard, it looked as though no one had touched it in years. Rarity sprung up behind me, wrapping her arms around my waist. “Are you finally going to join in the singing?” “No, I don’t sing, ever. Just play. I’d thought I would play a couple Pelton John songs that I know, you know to join in on the fun. Like you sing, I play?” “Oh come now, I have heard you humming during finals while you worked on your projects with Vinyl,” She whispered into my ear, “and it sends chills down my spine.” I chuckled at the dirty quip. “Fine, I may be able to sing something. Remember the first thing I played for you?” “Of course darling, that it is my favorite song.” “It just so happens that I know how to sing the song that goes along with it.” Rarity’s face lit up like a firework at this, accompanied by her semi crazed laugh that she gets when she does something fabulous, kind of like a Wahaha. “Can you please sing it for me? Please, please, please?” She pleaded, putting on her best pouty lip face. I look from side to side and then back to her. “Not here.” I gesture to the window. Rarity nodded and walked over to her father, whispered something in his ear and then grabbed her coat and ran out the front door, giggling like a schoolgirl. I quickly jumped to the window, opened it up and zipped out to the night. I landed in front of the apartment door and waited for Rarity to finally come outside into the night with me. A couple minutes later, she finally opened the door and walked out to me. “Took you long enough” I laughed at Rarity. Jokingly angry, she jumped at me. I grabbed her up in my arms and took to the air. This was the first time I had actually carried someone in flight. I was having a hard time figuring out the correct rhythm to my flight pattern but after a few seconds, I got the hang of it, boosting my confidence greatly. Flying higher and higher, faster and faster, I never felt so alive. That is until someone grabbed my wing in her magic and forced me to land. It was a small canyon area. “Ok, think this is far enough away from everyone?” I asked Rarity as I placed her back down onto solid ground. “Yes, I do believe this is far enough away. The only thing for a solid mile here is pure granite hills. I shall say that I will probably never be used to the idea of flying, let alone the actual activity.” “You never thought how it would be like to have wings?” “I have before. Twilight offered me a chance to have wings for a few days back in our senior year, but I turned the offer down. The wings that she made were stunning and sometime how I wish I had taken her up on her offer. But enough about my latent dreams of flying, now you can tell me why you refused to sing in front of everyone?” Rarity said, wearing a look I had become all too familiar with. I had kind of hoped she would let this one go, but that was not her at all. “I’m not a great singer?” I sheepishly lied. “Oh come now, I may not be as good as AppleJack determining if someone is lying but I can tell that that was a large one. Go on, sing.” “It’s going to be bad, I don’t really sing well in front of people. Got made fun of a lot for having a super high voice back when I was twelve. Even though my voice is actually kind of low now, I am pretty self-conscious about a lot of things about me, so I just don’t sing in front of anyone.” “Well now, I’m not just anyone.” She smiled lovingly towards me as she sat down on a rock, awaiting her private concert. “Well, um alright here goes.” I said nervously. I could feel my palms start to sweat and my breathing race as I tried to calm myself down before started, but I couldn’t. My eyes darted towards the ground and up into the sky. As I looked straight up, the stars engaged in a sort of small dance in their own right. The twinkling from one to the next was mesmerizing, but there was a pattern in their shine. I followed it along its massive path in the sky until it dropped behind Rarity. I stopped right in my tracks for the second time tonight as I gazed at her unashamedly, feeling my wings rapidly unfurl to their full extent. The stars were beautiful, but were nothing compared to those sapphire pools. Her purple hair gleaming under the moonlight and her skin flawless. But it was her smile, that smile that won me over. That smile could light up a thousand worlds and make any star seem dim incomparrison. I could feel myself calm and settle into a sort of trance. It was weird for me to think it. That everything she had done today, had been for me. The parents the coat the trip. All so she could spend time with me. I felt my heart race at the thought of her wanting me to be close with her. I didn’t know what her true feelings were other than she had been drawn to me and she felt safe, but I did know this. I was starting to fall hard, and I could only hope as I inhaled a large breath to start singing, that everything would turn out alright.